Disenchanted
by Yuuki no Yuki
Summary: When I imagined being a witch I imagined magic and flying. I imagined proving to the world that Slytherin and Evil are not synonymous. I imagined love and adventure. But most of all I imagined waking up-eleven years old-on the Hogwarts Express alongside Harry and Ron. So why, pray-tell, am I in a nursery, in 1970? This is not what I imagined! A realistic SI.
1. 1970

**A/N:** So this is my first attempt at a Self-Insert, the point of this fic is to explore the idea of a character with knowledge of the future that grows up between the Marauder Era and Harry's Hogwarts Career. As a self-insert the main character is based off of me and my reactions, thus there may be character bashing, but rest assured I shall keep all characters in-character and any-bashing will be internal and only affect the story in how my character chooses to interact with the rest of the Harry Potter cast.

Also, I am a Slytherin, I have always been a Slytherin, I shall always be a Slytherin. The same goes for my character. I don't think there is anything wrong with the other houses. I just don't want to get to the point of her sorting and lose half my readers because they want 'this' house or 'that' house. So, please, no Slytherin bashing. The extremity of house-rivalries will be explored later in the fic so I'll save my opinions on House-bashing for those chapters.

Hope you enjoy!

* * *

_**Prologue** _

When I first came to in this-new-world I found myself surrounded by a bunch of weirdo priests chanting some sort of spell. At the time I could do nothing but scream at the weird occult scene I found myself in. In later years I would come to learn that my mother had paid some Charms Masters a lot of gold to 'bless me' with long-life, something that seems to have evaded my family for generations.

When I brought this to my mother's, for she was not my 'mom,' attention she would simply say"those whom the gods love die young" and I would be left to stifle a giggle at the irony of such a statement. After-all, if the gods' love kills you then is it their hate that brings you back?

Those are the sort of thoughts I allowed myself to ponder as I lay awake bored out of my mind those first few months. I am ashamed to say that it took me much too long to work out what had happened, although fear played a big part in it. I could deduce early on that I was not stuck in some rather vivid coma and had in fact been re-incarnated, but that thought often led to the question; how did I die? And while death may be an uncomfortable topic for most, I found myself more worried by my lapse in memories.

Alright, 'worried' was putting it mildly. I was rather young to have died in my first life-19-but still rather well adjusted, I was a year ahead in my University studying Chemistry with the best of them, even writing a book on the side. I had gone through a lot in my early years and it shone through in my laid-back care-free take on life.

Not much could have shaken me, and in fact neither my death nor my re-birth registered as more than 'inconvenient' at the time. Their was nearly 20 years of work flushed down the drain, however, despite my general resilience I have always had a major-crippling fear. It stemmed from a throwaway line years back on how 'we are what we remember.' Just a nice little aphorism, but it got me to thinking and a mind can be a heinous place. Mine lead me in maze of circles before spitting me out with a sever fear of amnesia and anything memory-loss related.

So when I died, I moved on, when I found myself in a baby's body, I shrugged, but when I found myself unable to access certain memories of my past life. When my dad's face began to fade and my three siblings began to mesh into one amorphous blob-I cried, nay I bawled.

I must have been a terrible baby, and it sure didn't help that whenever I let loose a whimper-when I allowed my thought to stray from philosophy such as 'Am I reincarnated or simply remembering the first few months of my life?' to anything remotely related to my fading memories of competing in gymnastic meets-I found myself being rocked to sleep by the ugliest midget I had ever seen.

It took me awhile to come to the conclusion that the gods must have more than hated me, and unbidden a quote from a lecture long-forgotten floated to mind about a girl named Cassandra with the gift of prophecy ; "those whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad." It would cross my mind, religiously, every time something went wrong.

For just like Cassandra, I knew exactly what was to come, after all denial would only let me ignore what was clearly a House-Elf acting as my nanny or conveniently timed exploding light fixtures for so long. And denial would definitely not explain away the two faces peering down at me with beautiful locks I used to jokingly compare to my own, nor the way they so carefully introduced themselves as my big brothers 'Siri' and 'Reg'.

Yes, like Cassandra I found myself with knowledge of a future most bleak, and just like her I found myself in the exact position to prevent people from listening to me. Truly, I nearly broke that year. If it wasn't for my two brothers and their constant attempts to make me laugh I would have. For it was their unconditional love that allowed me to find a purpose, and in finding a purpose, a reason to more than live, but thrive.

Born Amalthea Dorea Black on December 19th 1970, I was the First Daughter of Orion and Walburga Black and I was the self-appointed savior of Sirius Orion and Regulus Arcturus Black. Baby or not, I now had a mission and I'd be dammed if I let anyone take my big brothers away.

* * *

Well there's the prologue, the next chapter should be a little longer, although I am going to keep the chapters between 1K and 2K so that I can update faster.

Thanks for reading!


	2. 1971

**A/N:** Here's the first chapter of 'Disenchanted'! It's a little longer than the prologue. I'm going to try and stick to short chapters like this so that I can update a chapter a day or so.

* * *

The year was 1971.

It had been a couple months since I first found myself in this nightmarish situation.

Time is hard to grasp when I'm constantly left to myself in a crib with only an astronomically correct night-sky charmed to my ceiling. People who say there are too many stars in the sky to count just aren't bored enough.

I only know its been a couple of months because Reg had a birthday party the other day, and from the whispered conversations I managed to learn that his birthday is in March and I was born in December, the 19th to be exact. I will say I'm happy to not have had my birthday changed from my first life.

Over the past four months I've managed to come to terms with my new family, of course I missed my own family, I mourned the loss of my mother and younger siblings but having lost a father at a young age I knew better than to look a gift horse in the mouth, after all I could have just as easily been reincarnated into an orphanage, or into a family like the Crouches, no matter what the books said about the Blacks the fact remained that Orion and Walburga...excuse me...father and mother, managed to raise two amazing sons.

Besides, I know I'm going to be a Slytherin, every quiz I've ever taken-including pottermore-has told me so, not to mention the fact that I simply like Slytherin. Obviously I don't buy into the whole blood-superiority crap that I'm bound to be hit-over the head with for the next few years, but I don't think that Cunning and Ambition are bad traits, in fact...for someone with knowledge of the future they are perhaps the best traits.

They helped me to decide early on that I'm going to prevent my brother's deaths-ambition-and I'm going to do so by establishing myself as a Seer-cunning.

I had many nights to sit alone pondering just how I'm going to affect the 'story,' in doing so I managed to work out just where I was and I can tell you my shock when I realized how _bad_ my timing was. It was currently 1971, granted it was March, but still I wasn't even able to sit up on my own yet, by the time September rolls around I'll be barely able to walk! Which will be very useful as that's right around the time Sirius gets sorted into Gryfindorr.

When the First War is going full swing I'll be seven, maybe eight and no one would be willing to listen to my opinion not when I can't explain how I simply _know_ stuff. The problem seemed insurmountable at first until I remembered that I wasn't in the same universe as my first life. Here it is totally possible for an eight year old child to know things she ought not to, if she was, you know, a Seer.

Now I've read plenty of fanfiction through my life-time, so I knew well enough that telling people to 'listen!' because you can 'see the future!' will get you nothing but laughs, or in my case extremely odd stares seeing as I hadn't said my first word yet, let alone a complete-if irrational-sentence. The only way this plan would work would be if I managed to convince my family that they thought of it. If they saw all the 'signs' and thought I was a Seer then when I came to them with my 'unexplainable feelings' or 'odd-dreams' they would be more open to listening.

My plan was actually rather simple. I only had a handful of things I knew about that happened in 1971, and nearly all of it had to do with Sirius attending Hogwarts. I knew I couldn't draw too much attention to myself, so I had to show my 'talents' like with all baby-magic accidentally. A child of my age should have no concept of time so if I were to say 'See' Sirius heavily aligned with the colors Scarlet and Red well, as a baby, how am I supposed to know that is in the future? And if, the day before he leaves for Hogwarts I 'accidentally' turn his hair scarlet and eyebrows gold, and then let out a cute squeal, well that's completely innocent, right?

I thought so.

Now if only magic were that easy to control. When I first woke up in this world and learned that I was a witch I expected to feel _different_. I always had this image of magic circulating through my veins, pulsing, and just waiting for a way out. I was wrong. Magic is far more subtle than that, in fact I can say with certainty that half the time I forget I'm even a witch. Magic isn't tangible at all, it's like a flame, get close enough and you can feel its effects see them even, but you can never actually **touch** it.

Accidental magic is even harder to explain. At first I thought it was simply wand-less magic, that kids hadn't been told how difficult it is and thus were not restricted by societal views on what their magic 'can' and 'cannot' do. However, over time I learned that it was more of a pressure-release system. Like a boiler with too much steam our bursts of accidental magic was a way of dealing with our ever-growing magical core.

There is a reason Hogwarts only accepts students when there 11, and that is largely centered on the fact that our core is not stable before then, it is ever-growing and latches on to any heightened emotion as a way of 'letting off steam' so to speak.

I personally think this is when our emotions become keyed in to our magic and thus become keys to various spells, such as the Patronus, or Unforgivables.

I managed to figure this out over the months leading up to Sirius' departure for Hogwarts. It was a lot of trial and error, and I'm sure my 'parents' were surprised by the amount of magic their less-than-a-year-old little girl was showcasing, but I needed to be able to do this. In the end I managed it, and when Sirius got his Hogwarts letter and was smiling at the world despite mother's admonishments of "your too old to be openly showcasing your emotions" I crawled over to him and demanded to be picked up.

I had been planning for this day for months, and saving every trick in the book to make sure my parents wouldn't just brush this moment off as another one of their daughter's accidental bursts of magic.

Thus I made sure it was an already important moment; Sirius getting his Hogwarts letter. Then when Sirius picked me up I made the moment that much more precious by uttering my first word, "Siri!"

And while I let that sink in, and my mom and dad started whispering to themselves in the background I just concentrated on my eldest brother's hair. I thought about how happy he was going to be in a few short days, but more than that I thought about _him_. That slimy, good for nothing **_traitor _**of a rat, and how he was going to make my brother...MY brother's life, a living hell. I thought about the next 7 years and how I was going to have to watch my two favorite people in this world, Siri and Reg, grow further and further apart.

I thought about Lily Evans and Severus Snape and how these colors these _stupid_ colors were going to ruin such a beautiful friendship, they were going to ruin **ev****erything****!** And I allowed myself to feel true anger that kids from all over would allow themselves to be brainwashed into thinking that they needed to end friendships, and ignore their family all because of some shoddy-old hat and a millennium old feud. Then just when my righteous indignation was reaching its peak, just when I couldn't take it anymore and just wanted everything to stop because he's gonna hate_-hate_**_-hate_**me _whenIweargreen_, his hair changed.

And with a whoosh, the relief that it's okay, I could still fix things, rushed through me, and I was able to put a half-a-year plan to rest with a smile, and tug of my brother's Scarlet colored hair calling "Siri! Siri!"

* * *

Thank you very much for all your favourites/alerts/and reviews,

I hope you liked this chapter!


	3. A letter

**A/N: **Here's the next chapter, hope you guys like it!

Review reply's will be on the bottom!

* * *

"Thea, look! Sirius sent us a letter! Oh, I wonder what it says," my brother murmured to himself absentmindedly.

"Siri! Siri!" I squealed as if excited to be able to use one of the first words I knew. Since my brother's departure for Hogwarts I had allowed myself to learn a few more words, nothing too complex, just enough to seem a healthily developing baby and to allow me a modicum of communication. Amongst my growing vocabulary were the words; 'no,' 'ya,' 'up,' 'huc,' (hug) and, of course, 'Reg.'

"Reg, up! Up!" I yelled, arms thrown up for emphasis, he just laughed at my absolute adorableness before reaching down to pick me-up. We must have made quite a sight a small 10 year-old boy trying to balance his 9-month old sister on his hip while trying to open a letter simultaneously. But it was the moments like these that reminded me just why I loved this boy.

He was such a gentle soul, as far as Reg was concerned Sirius could be the heir, he could deal with all the people, and parties. Reg was, much like I, a giant introvert. I'm not sure if Mother or Father noticed, although they would probably consider it a fault, but I know Siri did. Half the reason he became the center of attention at parties was to prevent people from noticing Reg being a wallflower.

I could understand where Reg was coming from, though, people were draining on the best of days but the sheer amount of soirees and fetes we've been forced to attend just within my first year of life have been truly off-putting. Anyone was bound to get tired of it after awhile or, you know, learn to crave the attention.

*cough*Sirius*cough*

"Thea, you listening? I'm gonna read you his letter now, okay?" I just smiled and started clapping my hands, eagerly waiting for the day I would be 'taught' how to read so that I wouldn't have to rely on Reg's charity to keep up with current events.

*Ahem*

x.x.x.x.x

_Dear,_

_Reg and Thea,_

_Sorry its taken so long to write but Hogwarts is just wicked, and James-he's my mate-would tear into me if he knew_

_ I was writing my kid siblings. (I won't tell if you don't.) The castle is like super old, older than the Black Manor, and just as magical. _

_But I'm not gonna bore you with the Ghost's gossip or which painting said what-to-who, Merlin knows _

_we got enough of that from Cissy and Bella. No what I'm going to do is give you two a mission, yup Reg I said 'two' the job is simply _

_too big for just one of you. I...want...you...to...tell-mother-and-father-that-I'm-in-Gryffindor-**okay-love-you-bye!**_

_Not gonna fly? Heh, yeah didn't think so. Look, can you please just get Thea to coo at them or something and drop it in all casual like? _

_I've tried drafting a letter to tell them but each copy ends up sounding like I'm apologizing for being Courageous or Chivalrous and yeah, _

_no, not gonna do that. So please, for your favoritest big brother in the world, tell them for me? _

_(I know you can't see but I'm giving you puppy-dog-eyes)._

_Lots of love (although if James asks I just said 'bye')_

_Sirius O. Black_

x.x.x.x.x

"...Sirius is in Gryffindor?" Regulus muttered turning to give me a look that was an odd combination of confused, heart-broken, and resigned. "Of course," he sighed, "of course he managed to screw that up."

"No!" I yelled, scrunching up my nose at where Reg's thoughts were taking him. You can't 'screw up' your sorting...its who you are, and as much as I loved my older brother and privately felt life would be easier if he were in Slytherin I couldn't deny that he had a Lion's Heart.

"Thea?"

With my limited vocabulary I found myself unable to give my well thought out and very rational argument on how a friendship that has lasted 10 years should not allow itself to be torn apart by colors that will only be worn for 7. It reminded me of when I was in French class, I had the answer...just not the words.

"No, Reg!" I repeated for emphasis. "Siri...Siri ya!" I smiled.

"You don't understand, Thea, Gryffindor's bad. Red is a no-no!" He pulled a stern face, "green is yes!" Here he smiled.

Argh! _This is so frustrating! Why can't he just read my mind or something?! _

"No!" Concentrating on Reg's short hair I tried to congregate all my frustration of being misunderstood and ignored into one giant blob of emotions. Reaching deep down into my core to that dark part of me that was just slightly resentful at my brothers for their ignorance. It was just so **_annoying_** sometimes. Here I was a grown-woman with the knowledge to change the world for the better being stopped because my brother was taught that 'red is a no-no' since he was old enough to talk!

It was harder this time, to bring up the emotions needed for a burst of accidental magic. I liken it to reading a book, the first time you read through it everything is so raw you can't help but cry. But by the second or third read-through the tears start to dry out.

But, hard or not it didn't change the fact that I need_need**need**_-ed this to work. Not because its good for the future, not because Reg should learn to be more open from a young age, but because no-one, _no-one_ should be led to believe that their core-character is flawed.

And I could already see how Mother and Father would use this as another way to pick on Sirius's 'flaws' and why can't anybody see that he **_hates_** rebelling. He doesn't _want_ to be the black sheep, he just wants to spend his days hanging out with Reg and I. But he was raised to have 'Black pride' and the first rule of the House of Black is 'we bow our heads to No-One!'

I could see in Reg's innocent whisperings the cruel insults of the future. How long before "screw up" wasn't tossed out lovingly like a kind reminder but brandished as a weapon, a knife poised to stab him in the back?

And as I watched the image of that perfect little family that I only just got and was starting to loose one-by-one crumble, I felt an emotion bubble up in the pit of my stomach. An emotion I've repressed for so long and so instinctively that I had yet to grow jaded by it.

Panic.

Unadulterated, uncensored panic, and-as is often the way with these things-it was beginning to spread; no longer was I only yearning the loss of my fabricated-ly perfect little family but rather the fear that this little boy in front of me would one-day wear a death-eater's mask. That little Reg, little kind-hearted, House-elf loving, Reg would be forced to pilfer, _torture, _and _**murder **_and if I was being honest there was nothing I could really do andIcouldfeelthewallsclosing too close, _too close, **too**_** _close!_**

"Thea?"

And there was _**nothing**_ to be done, and why did Sirius have to put this on my shoulders? Why did he have to be a Gryffindor?! But then he would be miserable_miserable**miserable**_in Slytherin, and argh! This stupid feud is just so annoying! They're just colors for Merlin's-sake! Just red-green, red-green, red-green over and over and Sirius-Reg, Sirius-Reg, Sirius-Reg around and around in circles and then-

**BANG**

"Thea?!" Reg called from somewhere far...far away..."Mother, Father, come quick! Somethings wrong with Thea!"

* * *

When I came to it was to a bunch of flashing lights and an odd stiff feeling in the depths of my muscles. As if I had run a marathon and then fallen asleep without first stretching down. It took me awhile to get my bearings but when I was conscious enough to notice that this was not my room and-was I at St. Mungo's? My...healer decided to fill my parent's in.

I was still a little out of it, but I did manage to grasp the gist of the conversation. Something about me straining my magical core, and that a baby my age should not be feeling emotions acutely enough to be using my magic to this degree, and are they sure I'm being cared for in a controlled environment because something is causing these outbursts and I don't _seem _to be abused or neglected but could they please just run a few more tests? And on...and on...and on...basically I realized that-opps!-magic has a limit and does not automatically replenish itself, who'd of thought?

Over the next couple of hours my parents and the healers seemed to dissect every little thing I had ever said or done, it was like this that I learned that I was way too far in my development stage for a nine-month old baby-once again opps-and that the magic I seemed to be doing was odd considering my up-bringing. (Apparently I had never seen the color red before changing Sirius' hair...my parent's whisperings suddenly made a lot more sense.) After discussing what led to my 'latest outburst' where I apparently made Reg look as if I'd splattered green-paint on him, and turned Sirius' letter a lovely' shade of Gold my parent's and the healer decided I was an 'empath' I wasn't truely acting on my own emotions but on those around me, I didn't feel the need to correct them.

Especially not when we were leaving and the healer decided to add that if I turned Sirius' hair _scarlet_ and not _red_ then I may even have some latent-seer abilities and weren't my parents just so proud of their son being sorted into Gryffindor?

Well that's one way to break the news.

* * *

Thanks to everyone who read and reviewed! Hope you all enjoyed another day in Thea's life.

Below will be my responses to reviews, I'll do this so that I can respond to everyone, including anonymous reviewers as I've seen a few other writers do so and think its a great idea.

So without further ado:

**JollyLoser****:**

Thank you so much for _both_ of your reviews! I hope you enjoyed this chapter too. Hopefully this answered some of your questions on what Thea's parents were going on about, and while Reg's hair wasn't turned green he didn't escape his little sister's wrath :) Yeah the family moments will be important as we all know they're destined to end.

**Chihori Anigma:** Thank you, and I do hope Thea is able make a big impact on the world, although she honestly only cares about her family right now.

**Raven's Gaze: **Thank you for giving my story a try then! Hopefully I can keep it from becoming cliche :)

**ToLazyToTry:** Thank you very much!


	4. Happy Birthday

The next couple months flew by with waning correspondence on Sirius' end...

* * *

_Hey Reg, Thea!_

_Today James, Peter, Remus and I learned how to transfigure beetles into buttons. _

_James and I managed to convince Remus to look up how to do the spell in reverse, and then at Dinner we cast the spell on all the prefects! _

_They all watched in horror as their top-buttons crawled away!_

_Love you guys, _

_Sirius O. Black_

* * *

_Hey you two,_

_Met the groundskeeper-Hagrid-and get this, he's half-giant! _

_He told us that if we take Care of Magical Creatures with Professor Kettleburn we'll get to see him as he's also the assistant._

_Love, _

_Sirius Black_

* * *

_Hi,_

_Been getting a string of detentions lately, wouldn't bring it up but McGonagall said one more and she'll be forced to write home, _

_James and I have a big prank planned for the end of term, so just thought I'd give you a heads up for when mother goes spare._

_-Sirius B._

* * *

_To: R. and T._

_Thanks for the trick wands Reg! _

_They sure beat the folk's gift, can you believe they got me a stationary set? _

_Again?! _

_James reckoned it'd make a good Frisbee-_

_(that's a muggle toy, he's been getting into Muggle things hoping to impress this Red-head, Lily Evans)_

_-so we chucked out of the aviary. All in all pretty decent birthday._

_-Sirius_

* * *

_Hey Reg, can you apologize to Thea for me? _

_I already asked mother and father for permission to stay over the holidays-_

_Lupin's been sick lately and decided to stay so James and I thought we'd keep him company._

_Honestly I'm surprised mother didn't send a howler or something about my duty as 'heir' to attend the 'annual yule gala' but anyway I won't be there for Thea's birthday, which I do feel bad about. _

_I got her gift already-transfigured it myself-I'll be sure to owl it by the 19th, make sure she knows I'm sorry, and that I love her!_

_- S._

* * *

That letter came in November 27th, a week after Sirius' birthday, and excepting a hand-wrapped gift that was delivered on December 18th was the last we heard from Sirius that year. I didn't mind, although I did miss him something terrible. I knew how distracting it must be for an eleven year old boy to be completely free from his parents and surrounded by people who looked to him for _his_ merits or faults rather than those of 'The Family.'

In fact I was just happy that he thought to get me a gift at all, and was actually quite excited to open it, along with the rest of my gifts. I'm not a very materialistic person by nature, but I absolutely adore surprises, and gifts were just another surprise ready to jump out at you. Not that I was expecting anything particularly clever as I was-as far as anyone else was concerned-turning one.

So I'm sure you can imagine my surprise-and delight-when I was awoken at dawn on the 19th and dressed in mini-emerald green-robes by Kreacher (well I say 'by Kreacher' but all he really did was snap his fingers) before being carefully carried down the steps to mother. Who proceeded to take me from Kreacher-which was big thing, let me tell you. I can count the number of times this woman has held me on one hand. Father was much more inclined to...well human interaction.

Anyway, mother took me from Kreacher and walked towards the fireplace, and I was trying really, _**really**_ hard not to get my hopes up, but then with a flick of her wand and a murmured spell some-powder found its way into the flames and-yesyesyes! They were turning green! I was going to get to ride the floo.

I suppose my excitement may seem odd, but let me just tell you that other than my brief visit to St. Mungo's during which I really wasn't in any right state of mind I have not left this house...ever. I have seen a grand total of four rooms; mine, the dining room, the sitting room, and one of our many bathrooms. I wasn't even old enough to be allowed into Reg or Siri's rooms as I may 'get into something.'

It was all very torturous, and rather horrible if I'm being honest. One can only crawl back and forth on the same carpet so often before seriously contemplating suicide. So when I realized that whatever my mother had planned for today included an outdoors excursion I was ecstatic.

"Ya! Ya!" I cheered clapping happily "Ou'd!" (Try as I might I still couldn't quite make a decent 't' sound.)

"That is correct Amalthea," my mother snapped shifting me so that I sat on her hip. I tried to hide a wince at the horrible name, after all it could have been worse. Siri had father's name as a middle-name, at least I wasn't stuck with mother's...I mean, honestly _Walburga_ sometimes, I can nearly understand why she's so horrid.

The floo trip was rather...interesting...it required a lot of spinning and I was curious if there was a link between dizziness and magical travel, after all apartation, floo, portkeys, even the knight bus all left one rather discombobulated. Maybe you needed to loose your bearings to reasonably imagine yourself somewhere else? I know deliberation is an important part of all magic but especially magical travel but I'd imagine it hard to imagine yourself _there_ when you can so clearly, see, smell, and feel _here_.

But I digress.

When mother stepped out of the fireplace it was to a nice round of-polite-applause. It took me awhile to recognize that I had simply went from one Black Estate to another. I snorted, my mother and I needed to have a serious discussion on what the word 'out' meant.

I was un-ceremoniously passed around from relative to relative who would give me soul-searching look, before nodding solemnly and introducing themselves. It was all rather, well traditional, and I was not quite sure how to feel about it.

On one hand parties were meant to be _fun_, they were about hanging out with your friends, gorging yourself on overly-sugary foods, and receiving gift after gift. On the other hand, this clearly meant a lot to my family, and how odd was that, that I was getting to spend my birthday with my family, not just my immediate family either. I was used to that, my immediate family I mean. They would attend every birthday I had...in my first life...but the rest of my family, the cousins, the uncles and aunts, even the grandparents, they couldn't attend if they wanted to. It just wasn't feasible with them living on another continent and all.

Besides, I'd been to Reg's party even if it was long ago, and he'd had a real-typical birthday. So perhaps it was just this birthday? I was turning one, and I don't know much about wizarding culture, maybe that means something amongst Pure-blood families?

I would soon come to realize that-yes-the first birthday is an important one to wizarding families at large, I would realize this when I was promptly placed in a high-chair with a bunch of, seemingly random, items scattered on the table in-front of me.

When the adults behind me started making-rather loud-guesses as to what I would pick I finally realized what was up.

_Doljanchi_

That's what this was about, this was my first birthday and in some bizarre twist of fate it seemed as if Wizarding Europe, or at least the English families (I doubt only the Black's would partake in this tradition) have adapted a Korean celebration.

The items in front of me each represented some future career or something, and in choosing one I would-supposedly-be choosing my path of life.

Well, bugger.

I'd yet to actually give it much thought, and I'm not sure just how much mother-dear would feel the need to follow the tradition and...ensure...I end up on my 'chosen' path. Luckily all the gambling going on behind me gave me a pretty good idea of what each item meant:

Quill: Scholar  
Purple Cloth: Healer  
Charms Bracelet: Architect  
Galleon:Entrepreneur  
Cymbals: Entertainer  
Brushes: Artist  
Snitch: Athlete  
Parchment: Ministry Official

I was truly at a loss for what to pick, I had wanted to be a doctor my first go-around but had just decided I like science for the sake of science before I died, so would that be a scholar? Honestly I just wanted to know what mother would have had me pick, but she remained auspiciously quiet the entire time, not leaning either way. I must have sat at that table for an hour before the group picked up on my indecision. Not long after whispers began to break out, things such as "she must have a path, right?" "surely she doesn't mean to apply she won't make it to..." "perhaps we have left an option out?"

The last one came from mother and caused everyone to peer at her curiously.

"Walburga," an old man, and Reg's namesake spoke out, "surely you don't mean to imply I have not taken every available option into consideration?" Grandfather Arcturus was a regal man who stood much like I imagine Dumbledore would. He hardly seemed the kindly old grandfather but as I would soon learn held a great deal of care for his son's children. "I have taken care to give Amalthea any option her heart so desires, as I have done for my son and he has done for his."

"I assure you..._father,_" mother said through strained indifference, "that I meant no disrespect. I was simply bringing up the point that the options offered are generic, and while that is often enough some...information, has recently come to my attention that may indicate a more **_specific _**option be made available."

"Of what do you speak, Walburga? What exactly is this 'information' and how did you come by it?" While mother remained resolutely silent grandfather seemed to grow progressively red-faced until "speak woman!" he exploded in what was to be the first of a long-line of examples I was to see of the 'Black Family' temper.

Rather than say anything mother just handed grandfather a sealed envelope. I managed to glimpse the St. Mungo seal before it was torn open with a simple 'flick' of his wand. I watched, silently, as Grandfather Arcturus read what I was sure was a summary of my 'empathic' abilities. I watched as his eyes jumped from the parchment to me, and back again. And I watched as sighing heavily he returned the letter to mother before swishing his wand over the table and conjuring two more items; a penseive and a...crystal ball.

Quickly before I could change my mind and think about the consequences I grabbed the crystal ball shooting a large smile at my mom. who-if anything-seemed to grow more sullen.

Despite my misgivings my choice seemed to be quickly forgotten and the party was left to become, well, a party. Cake was brought out and presents given, a vast majority of them new robes or simple baby toys, although I was rather disturbed by the house-elf plushy complete with voodoo pins.

By the time we returned I was well past exhausted and looking forward to being placed in my crib, and allowed to sleep. I was so tired that I had forgotten all about Sirius' gift and the fact that I hadn't seen Reg all day, apparently my first birthday party was 'no place for a child'...right.

So when Reg walked in moments after I'd been spirited away into my crib by Kreacher with two badly wrapped gifts I was extremely surprised, and this-of course-absolutely made my day.

"Here Thea," Reg called as he handed me a bundle of green gift-wrap. "Kreacher helped me make it," he added sheepishly. I tore into the paper with reckless abandon only to discover two silver mits and a knitted green-hat that was...just a little to small for me. At the realization a blush seemed to completely overtake his face and I could only coo at how cute my brother was. "I'll get mother to re-size it in the morning."

At the sight of my laughter he seemed to relax and handed me the next gift, in predictably red gift-wrap, with a mumbled "from Siri" before stepping back and peering curiously at the gift. It was painfully obvious that Reg had been just as curious as I since the gift had arrived but had refrained from opening it out of some curtesy for his little sister, and isn't that just the sweetest. I made sure to send Reg a brilliant smile before tearing in to Siri's gift.

After a few seconds I managed to reach the gift and had to stifle a gasp. It was the most rag-tag, poorly transfigured, attempt at a lion I had ever seen...and I loved it. Even when I could tell from a glance that Sirius had clearly just taken one of his scarves and thrown spells at it until he was satisfied. I loved it from it's missing right eye, to its balding head. It was just. so. cute!

Unfortunately my opinion's weren't shared by Reg who muttered derisively under his breath about how Sirius could have "put in some effort" and shouldn't be trying to "corrupt me." Considering the color-scheme of his gift I wasn't too sure he had any place to complain, but I was tired and it was my birthday, and the last thing I wanted was to go to sleep with the knowledge that Reg was unhappy so, without any thought, I took my brother's slightly-too-small green hat and shoved on Leo's head, yes I already named him.

I then held him up like Simba from _The Lion King _and began to chant "Reg, Siri, Reg, Siri, Ya!"

My cuteness seemed to break through Reg's mood as he just bent down to kiss me on the forehead and whisper "you're something else Thea," before tucking Leo and I into bed, and as I held Leo close and drifted off I couldn't help but think that I really was quite lucky.

The hat never was re-sized.

* * *

Thanks to all who read/reviewed/alerted/favourited

Hope you enjoyed it!

X.X.X.X.X

**Raven's Gaze: **Thank you!

**JollyLoser:** Thank you for your reviews, well I doubt I could keep making my chapter's better I'll strive to keep them all at 'good,' and yes I do plan on exploring the Black family as much as possible although a large number die off before Sirius is released in Cannon, so it will be a challenge. You are also right to assume Thea will give her all for something she believes in, even if its too her detriment. I'm sorry to say that you'll have to wait a while for the Weasley's but the Potters do come in a bit next chapters, and the Malfoy's are bound to make an appearance sooner or later. As for Peter, well you'll just have to wait and see ;)


	5. A New Year

Wow, I'm super happy about the amount of views this fic is garnering it sure seems to be picking up popularity, I just hope the chapters continue to be up to your standards!

I wasn't able to update yesterday, so to make up for it, I tried to make this chapter just a little bit longer. :)

* * *

Six days after my birthday, and I found myself facing my first Christmas, or should I say Yule. It was very similar to all the Christmases of my past. I was woken up by Reg, dragged downstairs, plopped in front of the Christmas tree and had a gift shoved in my hands. Granted in my first life I was the eldest and thus took part in the waking up and gift shoving portion of the morning.

In fact I would venture to say it was a perfectly normal Christmas, until-of course-the Yule Ball. As a baby I was, luckily, excused from attending it. But I heard enough ranting from Reg about it to know that I would have hated the evening.

It was apparently being held by the Malfoy's this year, and was where Narcissa's engagement was formally announced. I don't know if having a sister changed Reg's opinion, but I do know that he expressed to me how disgusted he was that his 'favourite cousin' was being 'auctioned off' to the 'highest bidder' while still in school, she may be 17 but he felt that she should at least have finished out Seventh Year before the engagement was made official, as things stood she would be finishing her final year and then getting married right away.

Reg wasn't very specific in his rants about how it was all _her_ fault, and that _she _'should have known what her actions would mean for Narcissa,' but I was able to piece together that Andromeda and Ted Tonks must have recently been married and thus Aunt Druella and Uncle Cygnus felt the need to rush their youngest into a suitable marriage to prevent 'a similar disgrace.' I have no idea if the marriage between the two was arranged or not but considering how long it is before Draco is born, well it doesn't seem like there is much love lost between them.

Either way, the Yule ball seemed to put Reg in a bad mood, one that stuck with him until New Years Eve when Father and Mother took us to Diagon Alley and we were able to watch the charmed fires dance across the night-sky like giant fireflies.

* * *

Just like that I welcomed in a New Year and with it, the knowledge that I would soon be left to Kreacher's care, as Reg too would be leaving for Hogwarts. While I was eagerly awaiting Sirius' return, and meeting James-who had apparently accepted an invitation to spend a week at Grimmauld place-I wasn't looking forward to the inevitable tension that would arise.

When mother had first heard from Sirius that he would like permission to invite 'Lord James Potter' of the 'House of Potter' for a few days she was surprisingly accepting of it. Although Sirius did manage to make the letter sound formal enough, and well James' mother, Dorea, _was_ born a Black-my middle name was a nod to hers.

But James was already head over heals for a muggle-born and my parents were rather vocal about their political-views from the get-go. There was simply no-way this summer wouldn't end in some sort of explosion. Especially not when Reg was already jealous of Siri's close, brother-like, relationship with James, a relationship he'd been able to piece together from nothing but letters. How much worse will it be when he can **_see_** just how close the two had become.

Thus the year of 1972 began with a feeling of trepidation.

I managed to put my misgivings aside and focus on the important things however, such as Reg's 11th birthday that came and went without much fanfare- although I did give him a nice long hug as a gift-and the fact that I could now walk. Which, apparently, meant I was allowed to venture off to my brother's rooms.

If I'm honest I was surprised by how easily the months were allowed to fly by. I didn't know much about pure-bloods but assumed like most aristocracy they would have forced Reg to learn a multitude of different things to make him 'cultured.' I was only one and mother had already taken to muttering in the background about which instrument I should start to learn next year, violin or piano. I secretly hoped she chose the violin as I already knew how to play the piano to a degree, and would hate to have to fake my way through the basics.

However, mother just left Reg to his devices, and other than a quiet admonishment for his anti-social nature, during his birthday-

_"The Avery's two children will be in your year Regulus, why not go over there and make their acquaintance?"_

_"...they seem happy talking to themselves, they don't need me to interrupt."_

_"Regulus, honestly child, it will be prudent for you to putt away this silly notion of embarrassment, you are a Black and Black men are_ not_ shy! They stand proud, as if the world is beneath them-for it is."_

_"I know, but-"_

_"-but nothing Regulus. Networking is a skill best learned young, Sirius may be allowed to get away with living off the family wealth, but you are not the heir and thus must make every effort to guarantee yourself the life you deserve after Hogwarts, now go and introduce yourself."_

_"...yes mother."_

-never really imposed on his life. Reg was mainly left in Kreacher's care and it was quite obvious that Reg thought of Kreacher as his closest friend-next to Sirius.

I had begun to think that it may simply be something about gender-roles, as a 'girl' I might have been expected to uphold the ideal pure-blood bride, stereotype, where as my brother's were free to be 'men' which-of course-meant 'do whatever the bloody hell they want.' This thought was quickly squashed, however, but moments after we had picked Sirius up from the Hogwarts Express and Mother had decided to relate to him how his Summer was to play out _hour by hour_.

The things she planned to put him through were horrid! Waltz lessons, language lessons-both Mermish and Gobbledeygock, Genealogy lessons, Etiquette lessons, then of course there were all the different events he was 'expected' *cough*required*cough* to attend; a ball, a galla, this person's debutante, and that one's christening, and every time Sirius interjected about plans he'd made with his friends mother would shoot him down with the logic that;

"if they are of a decent sort then you have nothing to worry about, you will run into them at one event or another."

It quickly became apparent that Reg was not being left alone because he was a boy, but because he was the 'second son.' As the saying goes "an heir and a spare," I might have been their third child but legally I was still the 'first daughter' of Orion and Walburga Black, which gave me a lot more political clout than you would expect, although it was rather dependent on who they could marry me off to.

Either way, I may end up the mistress to a most noble and Ancient House and needed to be trained accordingly, likewise Sirius was to be the Master of the House of Black so he too needed to be ready to take over should Father die. Reg, however, had no real importance unless Sirius died or was disowned and so was-apparently-not worth the effort to teach.

How I had managed to miss this I shall never know, but the fact of the matter remained that-to mother and father-Reg may as well have been invisible. Now that's not to say they didn't love him, of course they do. But they didn't expect much of him, and that does not do wonders for a child's self-esteem. After all, just look at Neville.

Right there and then I vowed to _never_ ignore Reg for Siri. I loved my brother's equally, but if I'm being honest Sirius has James, and Lupin and eventually Lily. For a few years more he even has mother, father, and the rest of the House of Black. But Reg, he has Kreacher...and now, me.

The next couple of weeks settled into a comfortable routine. I would wake up around 9, be spirited down stairs where Siri, Reg and I would eat breakfast-our parent's all ways took all their meals sans dinner elsewhere. After that I would be left to wonder the house, Reg and Siri would play some make-believe game that I inevitably turned in to tag. Of course the boys never ran at their true speed as I would make it a point to let out a high-pitched screech any time it looked like they were going to catch me. I became the tag-queen, although it did help that if I looked like I was going to loose I just let loose a few tears.

I suppose emotional manipulation of some pre-pubescent boys was not exactly ethical, but what use was it being the youngest if I couldn't milk it every once in awhile? Besides, I justified it away as 'family bonding.' I was drawing heavily from my memories of playing with my own younger siblings, and was eagerly awaiting the 'why' phase. I was planning to treat it like a drinking game, every time Mother or Father said something that was either prejudice or elitist I would turn to them and ask 'why'?

That was part of the reason I was making myself into such an adorable baby, it should protect me from any serious consequences later on when my parents realize what a precocious-yet curious-child I was. I was hoping to come across as 'charming' that way any odd quirk or disagreeable view could be written off as 'part of her charm' or something equally silly.

Anyway, after we had finished playing Kreacher would call us to the dinning room for lunch. It was around this time that mother would return from wherever she had run off to (it was only because Father left for work at 8 and Mother left to do who knows what that we were able to get away with a few hours of acting like children.) After lunch she would force Sirius upstairs in the study where he would then stay practicing the poison of the day until supper, while he did that Reg and I were told to 'use this time productively' so as to 'better ourselves' what this basically boiled down to was Reg hanging out with Kreacher in little hiddey-holes around the house, while I kept putting the same square blocks into the same square holes with the slight hope that Mother would realize I had the concept of shapes down so that I could perhaps get more interesting toys.

When supper rolled around Father would return home, I was never quite sure where he worked, or even why he did so. As the Head of the House he had no need to do anything. Although with a Father like Arcturus, who received an Order of Merlin for his advancements in transfiguration, it was not too surprising that Father felt the need to be doing something with his life. Merlin knows he'd be driven to suicide if he were forced to stay in the house with Mother all day.

After supper Father would sit by the fireplace and read the _Daily Prophet _out loud. It spoke of political unrest and rumors of a new party forming to challenge the current balance of power between the Ministry and the Wizengamot. All in all, pretty boring but at least it proved that Voldemort had yet to make any moves. At least any news-worthy moves.

While Father read, Mother 'encouraged' Sirius to reply to any mail he had received at breakfast that day. She would sit herself right next to him and constantly correct his grammar and spelling. Reg took this time to practice his reading and had taken to a book about basic runes and their affect on potioneering. While I made myself comfortable next to him, with Leo in my arms and tried to capture the moment in my memory. Which, inevitably ended up with me asleep on the couch. Only to wake up at 9 o'clock the next day in my crib...again.

This continued day in and day out until about three weeks before summer's end. The day started the same as any other, I ate breakfast, I played tag with my brother's, I faked a few tears, and Mother returned home. Only this time instead of sending Sirius upstairs to the study she sent him to his room so that he could change into his best robes, after all we were expecting the future 'Lord Potter' at any minute.

Sirius changed so fast that I'm pretty sure he had Kreacher do it for him and was back downstairs before Mother had even finished talking, and it was a good thing too, for at that very moment our fireplace turned green.

* * *

Thanks to all who have read and reviewed!

**Kaito The Shadow Wrya: **Thanks!

**SilverWolf1978:** Thank you, right now she's sort of relying on the power of her cuteness to keep her family together, at least until she can do more physically to change what she considers 'wrong' with the future.

**Ookamihime Ichimaru:** Thank you, I've also always wanted to read a fic where Reg and Sirius have a little sister, but could never find one. So when I decided to do a self-insert this was one of the first scenarios to pop into my head :) hopefully I can do it justice!

**JollyLoser: **Thank you, and yes Sirius has started slowly pulling away from his 'kid siblings' as any older brother would do after making some friends his 'own age.' I am happy that you enjoy the other Black character's as they'll play just as big a part in Thea's life as Siri and Reg, and I am trying to do them justice as your right that people tend to read 'pure-blood elitist' and think both 'death eater' and 'evil' rather than 'human' hopefully my fic will be able to convey that there was more to the Black family than what was seen by one rebellious teenager.

**SNicole25: **Thank you, and it's both of them, technically. She was born in the same year as Bill-they'll both be first year's together-but Charlie is only two years younger than Bill as is Nymphadora Tonks. This means that-in Canon-she's set to graduated two years before Harry starts at Hogwarts.

**telmios: **Thank you for giving it a try then :) I am trying to make and keep this original.


	6. James Potter

When I first met James Potter, I was in shock.

The book had described James as a slightly cocky, self-confident, yet genuinely kind kid. Up until this point I never realized how much I had allowed my views of people to be colored by those novels. Sirius and Regulus were fine, I had been in their presence since before I had even realized where I was and by the time I had put two and two together I had already formed my own opinions of them. The rest of my family was fine too as not much was ever mentioned about them beyond the fact that they were pure-blood supremacists, but James was really the first person I'd met that I'd allowed myself to-subconsciously-form an opinion of before I'd even met him.

So when Mr. and Mrs. Potter floo-ed in I expected James to swagger in behind them, chest puffed out and charming smile lighting up his face. What I got was a twitchy little kid with messy hair and soot over his face trying to hide a scowl.

It turned out that James' parents, Charlus and Dorea Potter (and Sirius' and James' faces were priceless when they realized they were related, first-cousins twice removed or something) had bought James a broom for his birthday but had refused to allow him to bring it with to show Sirius. As, what with Sirius not owning a broom himself, that would be seen as an insult by mother and father.

James hadn't taken well to their ruling and had been sulking ever since. It came as a bit of a surprise that he was, so, well, _childish_, and I know I should have expected it, he was 12 at the oldest, and yet it just...didn't seem to click with what I knew of him.

I mean, okay sure he was a prankster, and a bully, I know he came across as arrogant but for all the flaws I had imagined and rationalized my way through (it wouldn't do to hate on Sirius' best mate) I had-somehow-forgotten, 'childish'. Honestly, I am not quite sure what I was expecting but it still came as enough of a shock that I had managed to miss the entire conversation that went on between our parents before the Potter's left and Mother dismissed us 'to go play' for the rest of the day.

In fact I wasn't brought out of my stupor until Sirius made it a point to introduce James to us, which was when I had my second great epiphany about the boy...

"Wow, mate your sister's adorable! Hi there Thea. Who's a good girl? You are. Yes, you are!"

...he seemed to be under the impression that I was a dog.

* * *

Over the next three weeks my perfectly calm ritual had been thrown into utter chaos. It didn't bother me much at first, I am a very spontaneous person by nature, and the routine of my life had become rather tedious at this point. However, after the thirtieth attempt by James to get me to say 'Jamie' I found myself ready to kill someone. It didn't help that James had taken one look at Reg and decided he "wasn't cool enough" to hang with Sirius and him. Sirius had looked torn for a moment or two before telling Reg to "go hang with Kreacher or something."

I only got them to reconsider by bursting in to tears every time Reg left the room. I was **_not _**letting them ignore Reg. In fact I made it a point to crawl towards Reg as soon as I saw James heading my way. It was my subtle attempt at telling him "you won't turn me against my brother" (I had started this after he had taken to chanting 'Gryffindor' at me under his breath).

James, for the most part, was actually a rather charming kid, even if he did treat me more like a pet than a child. With him in the manor Sirius had been let off the hook for most of his lessons, and as such always seemed to have a smile on his face. On the rare days that mother forced Sirius up to the study so as not to fall behind on his 'goobldegook' James was more than content to play with Reg and I, and the two seemed to get along surprisingly well. James having accepted Reg as a sort of pseudo-Remus after a few days was awarded by a lot of smiles from me.

He seemed to pick up on that really quickly, that the kinder he was to Reg the more I would do for him. Whether it was allowing him to pick me up or trying my hand at his name-I had managed 'Jay' by the time he left. In some weird twist of fate it seemed that_ I_ was training _him._ Of course the fact that Sirius was happy to see his best-mate and little siblings get along may have had something to do with James' compliance.

He did seem to adopt a sort of amused-resigned expression early on, so he may have just been humoring me. Either way I made it a point to act extra cute, I will freely admit that I was abusing the fact that James had absolutely no immunity to my cuteness to my advantage, it helped that by being the only child of an elderly couple James' was very accustomed to getting his way and so often didn't question any thing I asked for, even when he really shouldn't have given me that third chocolate pudding cup.

All in all things seemed to be going well...too well. So it didn't come as much of a surprise when everything went to hell on James last day with us.

* * *

The day started the same as any other, with the only change being that I had decided to bring Leo down to breakfast with me. Today was James' last day with us and as he had been extra kind to Reg and I last night (he had given us a crash course in transfiguration) I decided he had earned a right to be introduced to him.

So when James had joined us at breakfast I made it a point to call out to him "Jay!" before waving him over to show him Leo. James had waddled over and looked at my lion with a bemused expression before handing me a piece of bacon as if I was a dog who just performed a trick and needed a treat. If I was feeling up to it I would have puffed my cheeks out and pretended to be offended, but, honestly, I really wanted the bacon. I was still "too young"to eat such greasy food, according to mother. So this was the only way for me to get some bacony goodness.

After that breakfast passed in relative calm, until the mail arrived. Turned out someone up there wanted a laugh as today was when Reg's Hogwarts letter arrived. Today was also the day that mother happened to be home rather than having tea with some old ninny's. So when Reg got his letter and James was there to congratulate him with a;

"That's great mate, maybe I'll see you in Gryffindor!"

Mother was there to respond with a;

"Certainly not, one disgrace was enough thank you very much."

Which of course got Sirius to leap in with a;

"What is that supposed to mean?!"

And before you knew it mother and Sirius had dissolved into an all out screaming match about how there is 'nothing wrong with Gryffindor' and 'of course there is its the house of mud-bloods and blood-traitors alike!'

Which quickly drew James' in who tried to calmly state that "there is nothing wrong with muggle-borns Mrs. Black."

Leaving Reg and I completely excluded, and looking over at Reg I noticed just how _hurt_ he was to be ignored right now. **Now,** of all moments. While he held his _Hogwart's letter _in his **hand!** He had probably been looking forward to this day for the past **_eleven years_**. I know I was looking forward to when I'd get my own letter.

_How can they just ignore him right now? Does this argument really have to happen here-and-now? Can't they see what they're doing to him. Argh! Sometimes people can. just. **be. So.** **BLIND!**_

"NO!" I yelled even as light-bulbs began flickering and the plates on the table started cracking. It had been a long time since I had truly lost control of my magic, but I couldn't find it in me to care that I could _feel _my energy leavingleavingleaving bit-by-bit, I didn't care that everyone was looking at me with a myriad of emotions playing across there face. And I Did. Not. Care. that I seemed to have introduced a mini-tornado to our kitchen, because **_why should I care_ **when **NO-ONE** seemed to care about Reg!?

I can't tell you exactly what I was thinking at that moment, I don't really think I was doing anything but feeling if I'm honest. I'm not sure just what I would have done in my anger, but luckily I never had to find out because at that moment Reg had walked over and given me a hug. Whispering, "it's okay Thea. _I'__m_ okay." Over-and-over-and-over again, until I was able to let go of all of my anger and just allow myself to drift off.

That moment was a changing point in my life, as it was the moment I learned three very important things;

1. My magic responded the strongest to my anger

2. I had apparently inherited the Black Family temper, as I couldn't remember flying off the handle like that in my old life. And,

3. Regulus was perhaps the only person, I knew, or would ever know, who truly understood why I did what I did, and said what I said, as he had been the only person to realize why exactly I had felt the way I felt.

While mother ended up on blaming my 'empathic' abilities and Siri and James had convinced themselves I had been taking their sides Reg knew that 'No' had meant 'stop.'

Stop arguing.

Stop ignoring.

Stop judging.

Just Stop.

He had understood. And he had agreed. And in that moment I truly felt like I belonged, if not in this world, or in this time, then in this family. Right there, in Reg's arms with him whispering, "It's okay. I'm okay. We're okay."

Because, if Reg understood, if he truly got it, then maybe...just maybe...things would be okay.

* * *

Thanks to all who read and reviewed!

**JollyLoser: **Thanks, and yes things are going to start heating up soon.

**Ookamihime Ichimaru:** Ha ha, well I'm happy you liked it, and as per your request here's an update today ;)

**Raven's Gaze:** XD well they certainly weren't _impressed_ by him.

**SilverWolf1978:** Here you go, some Thea and James interactions, and don't worry most people wouldn't have thought too much on Reg but I needed some realistic interactions and all we know about him is that he's the "perfect son" which normally comes about when your desperate for your mother/father to acknowledge you. Thus their 'non-existant' relationship was born! (It also helped to explain away his closeness to Kreacher.)

**Guest: **Wow, thank you very much. That is a great compliment that I'll try to live up to.

**SNicole25:** Well you know, a little bit of treating her like a pet, an attempt or two at brainwashing her into a Gryffindor, and of course, ultimately, becoming her slave :)


	7. In Memoriam

**A/N: **This chapter is sort of an interlude, it gives us a better look at Thea's current psyche as well as setting the stage for a small time-skip. For those of you who don't know today is Memorial Day in America, so this chapter is also written as a small tribute to any and all who have suffered loss. Hope you guys enjoy!

* * *

"Calm and deep peace in this wide air,

These leaves that redden to the fall;

And in my heart, if calm at all,

If any calm, a calm despair."

_~In Memorium XI~ _

_Lord Tennyson_

* * *

**~(+)~**

* * *

You never know what you have until you've lost it. This is a truth that we all know, whether we understand it or not. I came face to face with this truth at a young age, when I lost my father.

Anyone who has ever lost anyone close to them understands the pain I went through anyone else cannot possibly imagine, and I can't possibly do it justice in explaining it.

But I can try.

First of all, the death is never what hurts. There's too much shock, too much disconnect for the pain to truly set in. You're suddenly left with this image of what life _was_ and this vague knowledge that _it won't be like that anymore_. And honestly, you can't understand what's to come. No-one can. After all who can envision a life they've yet to live?

No, the death shocks you, jolts you from your complacency, and strikes fear into your innermost being with the knowledgeable that **nothing** will ever be the same again.

But what **_hurts_** you, is your life after the death.

What makes you cry at nights, is how everything is suddenly **tainted.**

It's no longer 'lets go to the park' but 'they used to take me to the park.' No longer 'Ive accomplished this' but rather 'I wish they were here to see...'

There's no more certainty.

They're not there to say they love you, that they're proud of you, that they can't believe who you've grown up to be, because they _aren't there_ to see who you've become.

And that is why people say that the pain never truly goes away even if days, months, years, pass before it hits you again.

Because it wasn't the death that got to you, it was having to live life one person too short. And every so often, when you least expect it, you'd find yourself in a new situation...maybe you were going off to college, maybe you were starting up a business, or getting married.

Either way, you found yourself in an unknown situation and you can't help but let that little thought-that you've learned to suppress but is always in the back of your mind-slip through; _what would they think/say/do?_

And then the pain hits you, all over again, when you're forced to realize that you **will never know.**

And all of this is assuming no regret on your part. That you cherished this person before their death and that they died knowing you loved them. So when someone says "you don't know what you have until you've lost it" you'd do well to not brush them off.

But the strangest thing about being human is that we know all of that and yet we do it anyway.

How many nights had I lain awake crying about my father? Swearing to myself I would _never_ take a person for granted again? How long had that lasted before I allowed myself to yell at my siblings? To disobey my mother? How long before I shamelessly tore down the relationships I had worked so hard to guard immediately after that loss?

Sure, I had allowed it to change me; I became more of a daredevil, I told friends and family alike that I loved them without any prompting, I started apologizing when I knew I was in the wrong.

But I never stopped taking them for granted. I never thought about what life would be like without them, I never realized what I had.

And now, they're all gone.

Perhaps that was why I was so quick to attach myself to Regulus and Sirius. I had just lost everything and everyone I ever knew and I was in shock trying to grasp the concept that-as far as my life was concerned-they were all dead. My mother. My sisters. My brother. My friends. Heck, even my cats.

Everyone I knew was dead. And that thought, _knowing _what **death** meant, and equating that to **the very people** who had been my _pillars_ in my past life. That thought was enough to **_break_** me.

So when two innocent little boys introduced themselves as my 'big brothers' I grabbed on to them with a death-like grip. Here were two people I could love and be loved by, two people that could ground me, here were two people that could be my pillars in this new world.

And the fact that they saw themselves as my "older brothers" only helped, I had been the eldest amongst my siblings I'd never had an older brother let alone two, so I never felt as if Reg or Siri were replacing anyone in my heart.

Not like mother or father.

Friends I could deal with, you could always make new friends, but family was irreplaceable family wasmeanttobe **forever.**

It was just a fact as far as I was concerned and such an attitude had led to me-unconsciously-distancing myself from mother and father. Even the way I addressed them spoke of this chasm, they were never my "mommy and daddy" not how my brothers' were "Siri and Reg."

I never thought about what this dependency would mean for me in the long run. I held felt some strain when Sirius had gone off to Hogwarts but Reg had seemed to double the amount of time we spent together, helping to push the pain to the back of my mind.

But with Reg gone there was suddenly no-one to distract me from my, admittedly, morbid thoughts.

Thus, I came to realize how completely dependent I was on my brothers.

Not only did they ground me, anchor me to this world, to this family. But they spoke to me, cared for me, included me. With Reg now at Hogwarts mother had begun to focus her attentions on "grooming me" into the perfect pure-blood bride.

The time spent together should have allowed me to grow closer to the women, but if anything it only helped to cement her role in my mind as 'care-giver' or 'tutor' but never 'mom.'

About the only good thing that had come from the time spent with the women was the fact that by the time Reg came home for winter break-Sirius decided to stay at Hogwarts again-I was speaking in complete, if simple, sentences.

Unfortunately, Reg was gone all too soon and I was back to my depressing life of lessons and solitude. This static state of mother, father, and I co-existing but not living together became the defining characteristic of the next few years of my life. I had fallen into complacency once again, taken my life and the lives of those around me for granted once more, but I had learned my lesson this time around. And the second I started noticing the signs that things were changing I snapped into action. I had lost too much to just sit back now.

So when father read about a 'new political voice' in _the Daily Prophet _one day, a wizard going by the name of 'Voldemort' I knew it was time to get my-then 3 year old-butt in gear. I knew pain, I knew suffering, and I knew loss, and I was going to be damned if I didn't learn from those mistakes.

No. I refused to lose anyone ever again.

If not for me, if not for what I've been through, then for _them _for the friends and family who had lost _me_, who were mourning for _my death_. Who wanted nothing more than for _me to be happy _wherever I was.

I would save Reg and I would save Siri and I would be doing it in their memory.

* * *

Hope you guys liked the chapter, it was sort of a filler, but I felt it important in defining Thea's thought process a bit. That and I needed us to jump a bit forward in time but didn't feel like going with the whole '_two years later_' thing.

Anywho, thanks to all who read and reviewed!

**telmios: **Thank you :) and here you go.

**Raven's Gaze:** Aww, I should have written that! I'll have to find a way for Thea to get back at James in the future, maybe an anonymous gift of a dog-collar or something...I can see it now, James would be absolutely convinced that the gift was meant for Sirius until he points out that the collar has his initials "JP" charmed on XD. Thank you!

**Ookamihime Ichimaru:** Thank you, and yes that was the beginning of the end I fear (unless Thea has her way that is). Ha ha, as you can see Thea's a little more than 'lonely' but she kind of brought that on herself.

**SNicole25:** Haha, James has definitely managed to get himself off the invite list. As for Sirius, he's bound to pick up on the bond between Reg and Thea...eventually...you know, when he manages to get his heads out of the clouds and actually take a look at what's going on around him ;)

**VivyPotter:** Aww, thanks! Well if she manages to change the future enough that James' survives for her sorting then I'll be sure to include a scene about his reaction.


	8. Nightmares

**A/N: **Sorry for this update coming later than the other's, I spent yesterday drawing the picture that is now the title picture of this fic amongst other things. Hopefully this chapter was worth the wait!

* * *

Malcolm X once said, "the media's the most powerful entity on earth...Because they control the minds of the masses." I had never quite believed in the power of media growing up, despite the stories my mother told me of her childhood in a country that had blanketed their media coverage for years.

I couldn't help it, America had always been so insitent on 'freedom of speech' that to try and imagine a life in which we _weren't _free to say whatever we wanted, a life in which the news _couldn't_ be relied upon to at least make an **attempt** at being un-biased, was like trying to explain colors to a blind man.

I knew, intellectualy, that _The Daily Prophet _was not really independant of The Ministry but I didn't expect such blatant propaganda.

Not that the change was immediately noticable. It started out, as most take-overs do, very subtly. There had been talk for years about a new political party arrising that wanted to 'protect magical traditions and culture' so no-one truly questioned when _The Prophet _started reporting on how the party was gaining popularity. After all elections were just around the corner and who knew if one of these so called 'Death Eaters' were going to run for Minister?

The news was good, and people were interested. It didn't help that the figure head of this party, a man going by the name of 'Voldemort' had managed to get the backing of a multitude of pure-blood families who both had the gold to make sure this endeavor had a serious chance at success and were old enough families to have chairs amongst the Wizengamot, which is a must in attempting to get any policy passed.

People could smell that something was up, and wanted _The Prophet_ to get to the bottom of it. After all, wasn't that the job of a paper? Thus when _The Prophet_ started phasing out other collumns that _just so happened_ to normally feature pro-muggle or muggle-born pieces in order to keep up with the 'peoples demands' well who were they to argue?

When this continued for days, weeks, months, well this party was just _so_ interesting! Have you read that paper they published on how muggles haven't truly changed since the dark ages? It simply _must_ be true look at the facts; Vietnam, the terrosit attacks at Olympics, and all this Cold War rubbish! And before long the paper had gone from reporting news to gossiping about what the 'Death Eaters' planned on doing next.

The amount of support they managed to garner was, frankly, staggering. Even though I should have seen it coming, it wasn't like Voldemort was an idiotic or impatient man, as far as he's concerned he's immortal so why not take the slow-and-steady path towards victory? It's tue that no-one really sees war until its upon them, but _still_ how was I supposed to warn anyone when the whole world was convinced that Voldemort was looking out for their best intrests?

It was around this time, about two months before my fourth birthday, that the nightmares started up.

Before this I had managed to convince myself that everything was okay, that I was doing enough by sewing the idea of my being a Seer (how else could my parents explain away the fact that I had known the Kent massacre was to happen months before it went down?) into my parents' heads. That somehow, although I hadn't quite gotten that far, this would allow me to "fix" everything that was to go wrong in my future.

But the past year had managed to dredge up some old insecurities, after all how much did I really know about the first war? And with these insecurities came the-very real-fear that I could, quite easily, fail at my self-appointed task.

Thus, the nightmares.

They were rather creative, and never the exact same as the other, but they all zoomed in on my fears of loosing Reg and Siri. My fears of having them _know_ I could have saved them but of my falling short. Or the worst, having them learn who I was and then reject me because, after all, _I wasn't really their sister. _

I knew enough to recognize that these fears were ridiculous, Siri and Reg weren't the kind of people to blame me for falling short, or turn there back on me for 'not being who they thought I was' (I conveniently ignored my first fear, as contemplating failure was something I couldn't cope with) but that didn't stop the nightmares from cutting into my sleep schedule.

It got so bad that my parent's had gone to St. Mungo's and requested I get checked up, when I refused to speak about my dreams...its not like I could really explain _why_ I kept seeing a thousand hands hold Reg underwater until he drowned, or a rat taunting a shackled dog on a moon-lit night, my parent's authorized the healer to use legilmency on me.

I was pissed.

Really pissed.

So pissed that I fear I may have permanently scarred the poor man, but I couldn't help it. If he was going to take a look around _my_ mind, without my permission (I don't care that my parent's gave their consent, I was old-enough to make that decision myself. Thank you very much!) Then I was going to make **_damn _**sure that he saw just how scary my thoughts could be!

Which basically led me to bombarding him with images of the Second Wizarding war, as anything else I could think of wouldn't make much sense to a wizard, let alone a muggle from the 1970s.

I wish I could say that this was all some ingenious plan to get my parent's to start asking me about the 'visions' I'd been having, but honestly it was just luck that had the healer announce that I was "finally" growing into my Seer abilities, and needed to be able to "talk about what she Sees in a healthy and accepting enviornment."

I nearly scoffed at that, if there was anything Grimmauld Place _was not_ it was "healthy and accepting," the same could be said for my parents and they must have thought so too as nothing was mentioned about my 'nightmares' until winter break when my parents asked, nay **demanded**, I talk to my brothers about what I'd been Seeing.

And wasn't that a suprise, Sirius home for Yule, but apparently a rather vague letter from mother stating only that "something is wrong with Amalthea, and she would respond best to your inquries" was enough to get Sirius to drop whatever plans he'd been making with James-and wasn't that just the sweetest?-and rush home with Reg who was equally concerned.

Thus I found myself looked in a room with two over-protective brother's and a chance to finally _make a difference_ and I could just kick myself, because I had absolutely no-idea what to say...

"Thea?" Sirius called snapping me out of my thoughts on whether to open with 'war's coming' or 'you both die.' "Thea what did mother mean when she said you've been seeing things? Did something happen that they're not telling us?"

I could only stare dumbfounded at my eldest brother, even if it made perfect sense, he had never been home when I'd had my first freak-out that had landed me in St. Mungo's and he hadn't been to my first birthday were I had chosen the crystal-ball, neither mother nor father were the types to bring it up in casual conversation and Reg-if he even knew himself-wouldn't have seen the point, having assumed Sirius already knew.

"Siri," I started cautiously, "I'm a Seer, I can See da fu'ure." I stumbled over the words, cursing my underdeveloped tongue as I went.

CRASH

Spinning around rapidly I noticed that Reg had dropped the books he'd been holding in suprise.

_Huh, guess Reg didn't know either._

"Wha?!" was his well-thought out reply. Sirius managed a slightly more intelligent "since when?"

Tilting my head to the side, attempting to be deep in thought. I managed to drag out the suspense for a few moments before cheerfully replying with, "I dunno, since fo'ever, I dink." I nodded as if proud of myself, "dey said dat I knew you was gonna be in Gryff...Gryfn...your house, for you were dere." Although that wasn't strictly true, I doubted either of my brother's would feel the need to fact check with my parents.

This back and forth continued for a bit until Sirius suddenly decided that it was time to get to the bottom of why I "looked like hell," which ultimately led to us discussing my nightmares. When Sirius asked me to tell them _exactly _what I had 'Seen' that had scared me so I didn't even hesitate. It didn't even cross my mind to be less than completely honest, or as honest as circumstances allowed, with my brothers. Not when sometime during our discussion Reg had sat cross-legged on the floor, and pulled me into his lap to show his silent support. Or when Sirius sat infront of me, arms crossed and scowl on his face as if he could protect me from my own inner-demons.

I couldn't lie when I was surrounded by the only two people who would actually care about how what I saw affected _me_ and not them. So when Sirius said, "Thea, I need you to tell me what you Saw, everything you Saw, and what you think it means," all I did was open my mouth ready to launch into, a long-overdue, rant.

* * *

Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter! Sorry again for the wait!

**Ookamihime Ichimaru: **Aww, sorry for the wait. Things have been a little hectic on this end, but I can promise you that the next chapter will be out real soon, as its already mostly written. Hope you liked this chapter :)

**purple sky always: **Thank you! I would imagine that depends on whether they are willing to accept the truth or not, a lot of people would prefer to live in ignorance after all!

**Raven's Gaze: **Thank you!

**JollyLoser: **Thank you, that was a big part of my reason for that chapter to get to know Thea for who she was and not just who she is. I can't wait to get to those scenes too, even if they are a long time in coming TT^TT

**Chihori Anigma: **Thank you, yeah most self-inserts conveniently skip over the fact that to get there the character died, or they focus on _how _the character died and never on what the character was forced to leave behind, so I tried to be a little diffrent :)

**fan: **Thank you!

**SNicole25: **Thank you, and I do think that she would have been forced to accept her parent's on a more personal level if they didn't almost encourage distance amongst their children. I imagine it would have taken a while but that Thea would have eventually come to accept Walburga as a 'second mom' the way one might to an aunt they are found of or a close friend's mother.


	9. Visions'

**A/N:** Here's the next chapter! Hope you enjoy it, the plot's finally getting somewhere. :)

* * *

_"An eerie glow painted the room-no cave-I was in with a green light. I could feel myself shiver at how...wrong this place felt. Most of it was shrouded in darkness but there were some things that stood out, most noticeably a floating cup cloaked in a miasma of death, and in front of that cup-Regulus.  
_

_Regulus seemed to be glowing himself, an odd white light surrounding him as if to emphasis that he was a man with a mission, and nothing-not even the evil of the cup-could stop him from completing his goal._

_I tried to call out to Reg, but the louder I seemed to yell the bigger the cave grew, and the further I was pulled from my brother. When I tried to take a step towards him I found myself shackled to a boat which I then noticed was floating on a lake, a lake in a cave? What felt like hours passed as I watched my brother's aura fight against the aura of the cup, dark and light clashing, struggling for supremacy._

_Finally my brother's aura seemed to win and the cup lay dormant, reaching into it he pulled out what looked to be a locket, and turned around. Seeing me for the first time. I expected Regulus to be happy, but he looked at me with nothing but_ **hatred** _on his face._

_"Reg-" I tried to call out, confused, "What's wrong?"  
_

_My brother began yelling at me, and although no words left his mouth-the cave remained eerily silent-I could still make out what he was saying;_

_"What are you doing here?"_

_"Going to get everyone killed!"_

_"-done enough already!"_

_"Just Leave. Me. ALONE!"_

_Reg worked himself up into such a frenzy that he didn't notice the dark aura seeping up from the locket in his hand, and stretching towards the lake. I tried to call out to him, but he would have none of it, he just kept ranting at me about how I should have _tried harder_ and _never let him join **them**. _Nothing I said or did had any affect, Reg just continued yelling while slowly advancing on the lake. _

_And the second his feet hit water, everything went to hell. The next minute there were hands hundreds of hands all pulling at Reg, pulling him into the lake and holding him there and_ _hewasn'tbreathing, and I**couldn't**move no matter HOW HARD I TRIED!_

_And then, they dragged Reg under, until I couldn't see him anymore, and I was still shackled to that boat for what felt like an eternity before the locket slowly floated to the surface of the water, surrounded by that dark aura once more._

* * *

"Wow Thea." Sirius muttered, shooting Reg a worried glance, "you've been Seeing that, every night?"

I shook my head 'no' "dat's only de firs' nigh'mare, Siri."

Sirius seemed to pale, before motioning for me to continue.

* * *

_I was outside, in the middle of some forest, and it was dark-around midnight. The only light came from the full-moon overhead, illuminating the spring-buds on each tree. I began pacing the forest trying to find someone, or something familiar. Eventually I managed to spot a doe in a clearing, she was a beautiful thing standing there bathed in moonlight, for some reason I felt as if I could trust her, and she seemed to trust _me _because she brought her young fawn forward._

_I reached down to touch the young deer when I was startled by a growl, a giant wolf and dog were suddenly in front of us, and they were circling each other in a deadly dance. Looking at them I was so confused, there emotions clearly screamed 'protector' they both wished to protect the fawn, but neither wished it harm either-so why did they feel the need to fight?_

_Just when they were about to lunge at each other a Stag in all his beauty charged between them, breaking up the fight. The next moment the scene changed. I was still in the forest, and the moon was still full casting the forest in an other-worldly glow, but the leaves on the trees had changed color-it was clearly autumn-and the Stag and Doe were nowhere to be found._

_Instead the wolf and the dog were glaring at each other from opposite sides of the clearing. I noticed a red string tied around the neck of each animal, and the strings seemed to lead deeper into the forest. Following it I eventually ran into a rat that had both strings tied to his tail. This rat seemed to be seeped in the same black aura as the locket from another time, which immediately put me on edge. _

_But I was curious as to where the rat was going and so I followed him, until we came upon a horrid sight-the doe and stag lay dead on the forest floor, their fawn nowhere to be seen. I turned to glare at the rat-for I knew he was to blame-when the scene changed once more. _

_Suddenly I was in a kennel, forced to watch the dog being mistreated while the rat, silently, mocked him. I tried to yell that the dog was _good, _it was the rat, can't they see? The rat was to blame! __But no-one turned to listen to me. _

_It was as if I didn't even exist._

* * *

"Are you sure those were the animals, Thea?" Sirius questioned me, deadly calm, "a rat, a wolf, a dog, and a stag?"

I just nodded, had Sirius completed his animagus transformation, yet? I didn't think so, it should still be another year, but maybe they knew what they were going to transform into... "an da doe!" I reminded him, "she was weally pwetty wid her red-coat an gween eyes." Was that laying it on too thick? Meh, too late now.

Sirius let out a laugh at that, "eh, so Prongs ends up with Evans in the end? He'll be pleased to hear that."

_Crap. _I thought,_ Sirius can't just go around telling people about my visions. I trust James, I do, but he's too trusting to have information like this. He could easily let it slip to _**Peter** _and then Voldemort would know, and even if he doesn't James would tell Dumbledore who is only a slight step up from the Dark Lord on my list of 'who-not-to-be-noticed-by.'_

"No, Siri!" I yelled, swatting at him for good measure. "I tell you an Reg cuz I wove you an I don' wan' you two to ged huwt! But you can't tell anyone!"

"Thea's right, Sirius." Reg whispered, entering the conversation for the first time. "A Seer, a true Seer who can both See and _remember_ events rather than just give a vague prophecy, is extremely rare. If it got out that Thea...knew things...well it could end badly, really badly."

"Ah, you worry too much Reg. Whose gonna do anything to her? She's a Black, she's about as protected politically as anyone in the country, and its not like someone's going to just sneak in and snatch her up at night, right?"

_Oh Siri, that's exactly what could happen._

Apparently Reg shared my sentiments as he just gave Sirius an 'are you an idiot' look, before sighing. "Sirius," he began, slowly, haltingly, "things...are starting to change...I've been hearing things, around the common room. Nobody is quite sure how or to what extent, but the Death Eaters are planning something. The prefects are already hinting that we may want get in early before 'things start to heat up'."

I was shocked, I knew that Slytherin was always more _in the know_ when it came to Voldemort, but for some reason I never thought that Reg would be privy to up-coming political unrest, and what did he mean 'get in' surely Voldemort couldn't have been recruiting already?

"Well yeah, I'm not an idiot Reg, they're obviously setting up to do something big, but that's just politic, what's that got to do with Thea?"

This time Reg openly called Siri an 'idiot.'

"Honestly, Sirius," he sighed, "sometimes you make me wonder..."

"What?"

"If Thea could predict the future," Regulus began as if talking to a particularly dense child, "then she could-theoretically-help the Death Eaters gain even more political power. It doesn't matter what they're planning, honestly, even if they just want shape the next Minister, Thea would still be valuable enough to their cause that they make efforts to...secure her."

"Dat's not what dey want." I mumbled, almost unconsciously. Blushing when Reg and Siri turned to look at me with confusion painted across their faces.

"What do you mean?" Reg asked, voice softly lulling me into a feeling of comfort, I noticed Sirius shoot Reg and I a look before shaking his head and coming to stand by Reg.

"Yeah, Thea," he interjected, "did you See something about the Death Eaters?"

"Uh-huh," I responded, nodding my head, "all da nigh'mares stawted after fawder wead da paper about dem."

Reg and Sirius exchanged a look above my head before motioning for me to continue, so I did. I told them about how "I couldn't be sure" but the "black aura" that showed up in both of my most prominent nightmares reminded me of the "feeling" I would get whenever I heard the name "Voldemort." When they asked me what I thought the Death Eater's were planing I told them with all the certainty a near four year old could muster, "war."

"War? Thea that doesn't make much sense," Sirius chuckled, uncertainly, "are you sure that what you Saw wasn't maybe symbolic or something? Like the 'war' means 'a difference of opinion'?"

I just shook my head 'no' "uh-uh, dat may be _why_ da war starts," I conceded, "but dere **is **gonna be a war Siri, I _know_ dere is." Sirius didn't look convinced, but I just let it go, I couldn't _make _my brothers listen to me, and Reg at least seemed to be taking my words to heart.

"Da Death Eaters are da _bad guys_," I stressed keeping an eye on Reg. If nothing else I could make sure he didn't grow up idolizing the group. Something seemed to pass before Reg's eyes but it was gone before I could possibly pin down the emotion. Whatever it was Reg seemed to make his mind up about something.

"Alright, Thea," he muttered, "I hear you." It was a statement that should have filled me with relief, but looking at Reg's determined face I couldn't help but tense. I was sure Reg had _heard_ me but I wasn't too sure that he had _listened _to a thing I said.

"Reg?" I questioned, but he just smiled at me.

"Don't worry Thea, Sirius and I will protect you."

_That's what I'm worried about._

* * *

Yay for fast updates! I just want to thank everyone who read and reviewed/favourited/alerted! You guys are greatest. Less than two weeks and already +2000 views! Hope you enjoyed this chapter!

**Raven's Gaze:** Haha, here you go. I won't leave you to dangle off that cliff ;)

**Milkbottle:** Thank you very much for your review. I am happy that you think its original as that was a major point in my starting this fic. Hope this chapter was fast enough for you!**  
**

**Ookamihime Ichimaru:** Haha, things are definitely starting to heat up, that's for sure!**  
**

**telmios:** Yeah Thea's been holding on to a lot, hopefully having her brother's know the truth-or at least some of it-will make her life that much easier.**  
**

**Chihori Anigma:** Thank you, Thea is sure trying her best!**  
**

**SNicole25:** Haha, yup, or at least Reg learns he dies. The affects of this chapter, however, are a long ways from showing themselves-unfortunately. **  
**


	10. Sirius I

~Interlude Sirius Orion Black~

Sirius Orion Black was not a complicated child. He loved his brother, he thought his mother was a few knuts short of a galleon, and he never really spoke to his father. These where the facts of his life that shaped his very nature.

He was an attention seeker, because Reg hated the lime light. He was "a rebel" *cough*disobedient* cough* because his mother's rules were all insane. And he was a prankster, because he wanted his father to notice him-as more than just 'The Black Family Heir.'

But above all Sirius was loyal.

In a family of backstabbers you sort of had to be. Extreme loyalty was the only way to convince yourself that you were _different_ from the other crazies on the family tree. Attention-seeking, playful, rebellious, and loyal just about summed him up.

Until his sister was born, and with her a whole other facet was added to Sirius's personality. He had become protective, it was his job as her big brother, after all. To protect Thea from anyone and anything that meant her harm.

In the beginning it was easy, Thea was a naturally quiet child. The only time she ever seemed to coo was when she wanted something. It made Sirius's parents happy. "A natural manipulator," they said, "a shoe-in for Sytherin." But Sirius didn't think she did it on purpose, more like she wanted something and coo-ing was the only way she knew how to ask, he was just happy that she chose that over crying.

Yes, in the beginning it was easy.

Although there was that brief scare when he first started Hogwarts. Reg had written to him to say that Thea had done some accidental magic that ended with her in St. Mungos. But it all seemed to work itself out, and by the time he came back everything seemed fine. If his parents occasionally glanced her way, well he'd been gone for a year, maybe that was normal?

Then James came to visit and if anything taking care of Thea became _easier._ After all, James fell in love with her and he was the second most loyal man in the world next to Sirius himself. Thea now had two body-guards, and Sirius chuckled when imagining the poor bloke who wanted to take his sister out in the future.

The next few years passed in blissful ignorance. Sirius became close friends with his two roommates Remus and Peter, so close that they were all currently practicing to be animagi so as to help out Remus-who was actually a werewolf. James found the 'love of his life' in Lily Evans, and Sirius found his 'eternal rival' in Severus "Snivelus" Snape. Both he and James had made the House quiditch team, he was a beater and James' a chaser. And it was all but guaranteed that Remus was going to be prefect next year, which would make life so much easier.

Everything seemed to be going great, until Sirius received a letter from his mother informing him that Thea had been taken to St. Mungo's **again,** and just like before, neither he nor Reg knew _why._ Sirius felt horrible, his job was to protect Thea, Reg could cuddle with her and read to her-that was fine, Sirius was never really good with that emotional stuff anyway-but **Sirius** was meant to make sure nothing bad ever happened to her, and yet twice, **_twice_** he had failed her.

Well it was no surprise when he cancelled his plans with James to tee-pee the Slytherin dorms with toilet paper that had been charmed to stick to anyone who attempted to remove it, and jumped on the Hogwarts Express. He would have gone to the Headmaster-he liked Dumbledore even if Thea seemed to flinch whenever his name was brought up-and demanded they allow him to floo home if his mother hadn't already warned him against "making a scene."

Apparently it was in Thea's "best interest" that the entire matter be "handled delicately." Seeing as Sirius wasn't quite sure what the matter _was_ he didn't think it wise to disobey, and it was a good thing he didn't.

To say Sirius was surprised to learn Thea was a Seer was an understatement. He was absolutely shocked. There hadn't been a Seer in the Black family for generations, occasional a metamorphmagus would pop up-just like Andy's little girl who was barely two and was already showing signs of the coveted ability-but Seers were much more rare.

Yes, hearing Thea was a Seer was shocking, but not nearly as shocking as the..._things_ she said she Saw. Ignoring the fact that Reg supposedly drowns to death-and that's not happening in a million years-there's the fact that Lily and James were slated to die. And unless he seriously misunderstood it would be at Peter's hand while he and Remus were too distracted with tearing at each others throats to notice.

Then to top it all off Thea decides to tell them that they're going to be at war in less than 3 years. Yes, shock was the least of Sirius's worries. Suddenly Sirius's entire life had been turned on its head, he now had to find a way to protect his best mate from being killed by their mutual friend who Sirius wasn't entirely convinced was evil-after all Peter _wouldn't_ do that, right? All without revealing his sister's ability.

He was at a loss.

So when Regulus pulled him to the side with some half-cocked plan to protect Thea after she had fallen asleep, well Sirius might have been a little too quick to agree. But this was something to **do** something tangible that didn't involve murdering his probably innocent friend, or hiring professional body-guards to constantly protect his little sister.

And if it put Reg in danger, well...he loved his little brother, would die for him, but although they disagreed on many things the one thing they saw eye-to-eye on was Thea. She _always, **always,**_ comes first. And if either one of them have to get injured in the process...well, they were her big brothers for a reason.

* * *

Here's a bit of perspective from Sirius, we'll get Reg's take on things next chapter, as well as a look at what he's planning. Sorry it's shorter than the others, but interludes tend to do that.

**A fan: **Thank you, we'll have to see, hopefully Thea will be able to do enough.

**Nicole25: **Well hopefully this chapter answered your question. Sirius did get it, to a degree, but misunderstood thinking the rat had 'killed' the deer, which makes it harder for Sirius to accept as he can hardly see his childhood friend as a killer.

**Purple sky always: **You are right that Sirius is loyal, and I don't think he'll drop Peter on Thea's word alone, but words are powerful and the damage has been done. He'll never be able to look at Peter the same way again, not completely. Whether that will change the story for better or worse has get to be seen though ;)


	11. Regulus I

~Interlude Regulus Arcturus Black~

Regulus Arcturus Black was a very quiet child. He found it easy to be quiet with a brother like Sirius. Everyone noticed Sirius, everyone loved him-or acted like they loved him-wouldn't do to get on the bad-side of the next Black family Patriarch, after all.

Regulus had no such protection growing up. If someone didn't like him, they told him. If Regulus screwed up there were no awkward chuckles and talks of "sweeping it under the rug," rather stern lectures on how Reg wasn't his brother, would never be his brother and so couldn't afford to act like his brother.

His whole life it seemed as if his parents wanted to pit Regulus and Sirius against each other. But Reg loved his big brother, and so chose the path of least resistance-he stopped standing out. Stopped drawing attention to himself. No-one noticed, at first, after awhile they began to pick up on how withdrawn Regulus had become, it seemed that in trying to hide Reg had cast an even bigger light on himself.

But Sirius picked up on it, and whether due to jealousy or something else, began acting out even more. Regulus never questioned it, too grateful that his brother's attention-seeking habits happened to save him from further scrutiny.

Over time Reg managed to fade into the background. His parents began to ignore him in favor of grooming Sirius to be the next Head of House. His family members labeled him as "withdrawn" or "boring" depending on his age, and any friends he would have made were too dazzled by Sirius's "charming" personality to pay him any mind. In fact the only person that ever seemed to even look at Regulus and see someone other than "the second son" was Kreacher, the family elf.

Sirius didn't count as Reg was almost certain that Sirius saw him as a pest who was a good person to pass the time with, at best. He had no doubt that the first friend that Sirius made in Hogwarts would instantly take his place in his brother's heart. Thus Kreacher was Reg's best friend growing-up, the only person who ever really _saw_ him...until **her.**

The day Amalthea Dorea Black was born was the day Regulus remembered what it felt like to be noticed by someone, and that feeling persisted for years to come.

No matter where he went Reg could always feel Thea's eyes on him, staring at him as if he would disappear at any moment. Originally he thought that Thea just didn't want to be alone but he later realized that she had latched onto him for some reason. Chosen to putt all of her trust in **him.**

Reg supposed it made sense, both mother and father preferred a less than hands-on approach to child raring and Sirius cared more about protecting their vulnerable little sister from harm than about showering her with attention. It came as no surprise then that Reg was-arguably- the most attached to Thea out of the family, and so the first to notice when she began acting...weird.

He knew that no-one else in the family noticed, Sirius thought she was just a quite baby and Reg's parents had left her up-keep to Kreacher who wouldn't know a regular baby witch from that of a giant. But Reg had always paid closer attention to Thea, so he picked up when her accidental magic started happening more frequently. Just as he noticed that all the attacks seemed to end with something splattered in color-normally some variant of red; pink, orange, rust, and eventually scarlet.

Reg was also the one who noticed that Thea wasn't very quiet, she would just save all of her noises for the night. When she would take to repeating sounds continually-almost as if practicing.

Yes, Reg knew that Thea wasn't a normal child long before any of them, but none of that mattered because Reg loved Thea-as she was and for whom she was-and that was enough for him.

So when Thea's first words were "Siri" it's understandable that Reg felt a little...betrayed, after all _he_ was the one keeping her secret-whatever it was-not Sirius. But Reg swallowed his pain and carried on, and was rewarded for his loyalty as over the next year Reg got to know Thea on a level that surpassed anyone else.

Sirius was at Hogwarts and his parent's were constantly busy, so Thea got left to his care. That's how he noticed that Thea never seemed to be 'all there' she was perfectly fine _mentally,_ in fact Reg suspected that Thea was something of a genius, but every so often Thea would seem to fade out, day dream almost, only to return later with tears in her eyes.

If Reg hadn't known any better he would say that Thea would act the way Grandfather Pollux would whenever he was recalling the days of Grindawald. 'Flashbacks' mother had called them, but Thea was far too young to be experiencing such things and so Reg did as he always did when confronted with something about his sister that he didn't understand, he kept quiet. After all Reg was not a stupid child, he knew what happened to people who were labeled 'different' by society, not everyone would be as accepting of his sister as him, see how much she loved the world and everyone in it as he did.

And Thea was filled with **_so much_** love.

She seemed to look at everything with the knowledge that it could all be taken away and so should be cherished while it was there. Reg knew everyone else was oblivious, his parents thought that she was looking at the world with a 'child-like innocence' and Sirius was hardly ever home anymore, and when he did eventually choose to _grace _Thea and Reg with his presence he decided to bring a tag-along with, a boy who-while kind in his own right-was **not** a Black and so had _no place_ in their home.

Not when he had Sirius for 9 months out of the year.

No Reg was the only one who understood how Thea truly felt, home alone, separated from her big brother. It was why Reg made it a point to read all of Sirius's letters out-loud to her. It was why he spent as much time as possible with her, knowing that she would be all alone when he went off to Hogwarts. And it was why, when Thea freaked out about his acceptance letter, Reg knew that she was hurting _for _him.

Calming her down had been one of the proudest moments of his life. Thea trusted him, _believed _in him, _**loved**_ him with _everything-in-her-heart,_ and Reg made a promise to himself that day, that Thea's trust would not be misplaced he would make _damn sure_ that everything **would be** 'all right.'_  
_

Thus when Reg read that letter from his mother about Thea's "less than optimal" condition, he felt as if someone had punched him in the gut. This was his little sister, his _baby _sister, that _**needed **_him and _why_ _was he still at Hogwarts?! _Regulus was in such a state of shock that he barely registered Sirius returning home with him, or his parents stiff reception, all he could think was 'whatswrongwithThea?' over-and-over again. His mind was going over every abnormal thing he had ever witnessed from his sister wondering if they could somehow be related, be the _reason _he was here, and if he shouldn't have perhaps told his parents because what if she had been _sick _and he was the reason that they had only caught it now? And on-and-on his thoughts continued, spiraling out of control, until at last he came too with one sentence;

"I'm a Seer, I can See da fu'ure."

CRASH

Reg startled out of his thoughts and briefly noticed that he had been carrying the same set of Potion Texts since leaving the Express, before zoning in on Thea and her recap of her 'dreams.' Slowly Reg began to relax, with the knowledge that Thea was alright, was _normal _even. The quirks he had noticed weren't quirks at all, but rather signs of her gift, and Seeing was a gift.

Even if Thea didn't see it that way now.

The rest of the conversation was eclipsed by his feeling of relief at the fact that his sister was okay. When he heard about his death, he managed to ignore it-and Sirius's look of fear-with the knowledge that _he_ died and _she _didn't. The same when he heard her convoluted dream about animals that seemed to mean something to Sirius but was nothing but gibberish to Reg, the animals died _not _Thea.

It all came crashing down when Sirius suggested telling people about their sister's gift-no curse, it was back to being a curse. Thea may be safe, but it was a 'for now' situation. As long as Thea held this ability men in power would want to use it. There was a reason why Seers were few and far between, they were either frauds or dead. No middle-ground existed not really, aside from pretending to be a fraud but that's enough to kill some people. To know what's going to happen, warn those closest to you, and then be disregarded because of your 'reputation' would be hell. A hell Regulus would not wish on anyone, let alone Thea.

Regulus tried to explain this to his brother, and he was happy to see that enough had gotten through that Sirius would be willing to keep their sister's secret for her. Reg knew that for all his faults Sirius was as loyal as a dog, if he said he wouldn't say anything then he _wouldn't _as simple as that. But any relief felt at one disaster adverted was quickly quelled at his sister's revelation that they were standing on the precipice of war.

Reg knew things were changing, had known for awhile in fact. The older Slytherins had been whispering for a while about 'him,' the 'new Dark Lord'. Regulus would even admit to being drawn in to their stories of a 'utopian world' were all pure-bloods could live without fear of muggle-corruption. Regulus was no fool, he knew such a world could never exist-not properly-but the idea of a world where Thea, Sirius, and he could live without the looming threat of another witch-hunt. A world in which Thea's differences and his friendship with a House Elf would be overlooked by virtue of their birth, well such a world was a dream that Reg didn't mind indulging in.

So yes, Reg knew things were changing. But he was much too young and naive to realize that change does not occur without resistance. To realize that what he had been fed for the past three years was but propaganda intended to incite a war. A war that would be fought by the very children Reg attended school with. No, it took his little sister spelling it out for him to see it;

"They're da _bad guys_."

And even then he wanted to ignore it, to close his eyes on this truth that he _hadn't asked for_ and _didn't WANT!_ And if it had been anyone else telling him these things he might have done just that, Sirius might have done just that, but this was their **sister.** They couldn't just ignore what she was saying because it made them uncomfortable, not when Thea was forced to live with images of that future running through her head every night.

If Thea couldn't block them out then Reg, and Siri, couldn't either-it wouldn't be right.

Which was why rather than ignoring their impending future Reg started plotting against it. He didn't tell Thea, she had enough on her plate and Reg knew her well enough to know that she would try to stop him. But he told Siri, after all he had to play his part _without revealing what they knew _which is what would happen if he wasn't told.

So Reg pulled Sirius aside after Thea had fallen asleep and laid out his plan.

"I'm going to act exactly as I have been all year."

"Huh?" Sirius questioned, completely at a loss, "well that's great Reg...but it's not much of a plan, now is it?"

"No, you don't get it Sirius. I'm going to act _exactly _the same. That means no talking to you or your friends. No hanging out with mudbloods-and yes using that word. No changing, period. If anything," Regulus continued, staring his brother straight in the eye, "I'm going to act _worse, _and you're going to have to start publicly denouncing me."

Sirius just stared at his brother as if he had lost his mind, "so you're little sister tells you a WAR is on the horizon and you're plan is, to what? Act like a douche?"

"Exactly Sirius, a war, not a battle, a _war. _The danger of having the backing of a Seer is that you get to see moves weeks, _months, **years**_ in advance. The game we need to play is a long one, but because of Thea's knowledge we already _know _the end-game. So why would I show my hand know when I'm in no-position to make a difference?"

"You know I don't understand when you use Chess terms," Sirius muttered looking disgruntled. Regulus just sighed, used to his brothers antics.

"I'm saying that anything I do now would be pointless, _and _suspicious. After all why would I suddenly change, start ignoring people I had been friends with for years only to hang out with people who have done nothing but torment my House? It would make no sense. Rather, I should continue as I've been, show an interest in all this Death Eater stuff, tell my prefects that I'd like to get 'involved' _become a spy._"

"You can't," Sirius began, "_I'm _the reckless one, Reg, and even I know that's far too dangerous!"

"Not if I start now," Reg disagreed, "that's the beauty of having future knowledge, a kid should have no idea that a war's on the horizon. There is no-way that I could possibly be planing against them at age thirteen. Or so they'd think. And if I got in now, and you start making people think we hate each other then it will seem like I have no connection to the light. How can I be a spy if I haven't said a single kind word to anyone 'good' since I was a boy? See, were playing a waiting game Sirius. I'm in the perfect position to get really deep-in; the young scorned, under-appreciated Black son. They'll eat it up!"

Sirius made a noncommittal sound, not completely convinced by Reg's spiel, "but if I can't be seen talking to you, then how would you pass on any information to me?"

"Through Thea," Reg continued, "we can play it off like Thea refuses to chose sides between us, she's so young she'll be what seven? Eight? When the war breaks out. No-one would think anything of her keeping in contact with her two older brothers, and she's already a Seer so its not as if either of us would have to feel guilty about putting her in danger by giving her important information."

"I don't know..."

"Come on Sirius!" Reg pressed, eager to be of assistance. This was something he could do, and do _well_, Reg had been playing a part all of his life, at least now his acting would _mean _something, "I can do this, I know I can! And Thea needs me-needs us-to take care of her."

Mentioning Thea seemed to do the trick as something solidified in Sirius's gaze. "Alright," he said, "alright, Reg, you win. You get to play spy."

"Thank you."

* * *

**Thank you everyone for reading and reviewing!**

**Raven's Gaze: **Yes, I doubt Sirius will go after Remus this time around. The only reason Peter was discounted the first time around was because no-one really expected much of 'little Peter Pettigrew' but the same invisibility will not be available to him this time around. Of course that's assuming things even turn out that way, this time around. As I'm sure this chapter revealed things will most certainly be changing. Haha, I'll make sure to get your James slap one of these days ;)

**Stromsten: **Sybill Trelawney was seen as a fraud largely because she _was _a fraud, at least in the eyes of the general public. It's true that her prediction came true, but the only 'real' prediction attributed to her was hushed up by Dumbledore so its not as if any of her students knew about it. On top of that the way the woman acted did not exactly add any credence to her words. Divination is a class at Hogwarts, one that has existed for years, so I have to assume that the Wizarding World as a whole has not dismissed its merits. Especially when one considers that other creatures-such as Centaurs-practice the art, and the sheer number of prophecies kept in the Department of Mysteries. That being said, I don't think Thea can keep up the pretense forever, although it does help that her first life was from 'the future' so that she does know certain facts about the world for many years to come. Trelawney was out of Hogwarts before Sirius entered, but if she _was_ a student I imagine she would have been bullied much like Luna, and that Sirius would now tell people to "lay off her" and that "she's not so bad." Sorry for the long response! . I started writing and couldn't stop.

**SNicole25: **Thank you! And anything that she believes will help protect her brothers.

**Whispers in the Dawm: **Thank you so much! I fixed both mistakes as well as editing out other small spelling-goofs . thanks for pointing them out!


	12. Ripples?

**A/N: **Sorry for the late update! Hope you guys enjoyed the look into Sirius' and Reg's mind, I'll be giving them Interludes periodically throughout the story, not always one after the other, and not always a whole chapter-long, but it will show up from time to time. Now without further ado here's chapter 12 of** Disenchanted**, enjoy!

* * *

The rest of Yule break passed in relative peace, it was great having Siri home for my birthday and I made sure to milk every moment of it. I think Reg may have gotten a little jealous with the amount of time I spent following Sirius around like a lost puppy, but he was just as bad as me-spending hours alone with Siri so that they could do "guy stuff"-so he had no room to speak.

Unfortunately, with my fourth birthday came the decision that I was old enough to attend the annual Yule-ball held amongst the 'top-tier' of pure-blood family's, and because Sirius was actually home for once he would be joining Reg and I...at the Malfoy estate. Now, the Black and Malfoy's go way back-according to Mother-even though Lucius was the first Malfoy to marry into the family in at least six generations. So mother made it a point that we needed to be on our "best behavior" all night, "or else."

Not that saying we go "way back" with a family means much, as the Black family-like most purebloods-could trace a connection to nearly every other pure-blood family out there. Cousin Bellatrix married a Lestrange, Cousin Narcissa a Malfoy, Uncle Cygnus a Rosier, Aunt Lucretia a Prewett, Grandfather Arcturus a McMillan, Grandfather Pollux a Crabbe and Great Aunt Dorea a Potter, and that was only going two generations back.

In fact, looking at Harry's year alone, I can say-with confidence-that I am related to Harry (through Great Aunt Dorea), Ron (through Aunt Lucretia), Draco (through Cousin Narcissa), Vincent Crabbe (through Grandfather Pollux), and Ernie McMillan (through Grandfather Arcturus). That's two Gryfindors, two Slytherins, and a Hufflepuff, and I'm sure if I cared to look I could find a link to a Ravenclaw somewhere. My point being that the fact that mother was so insistent that we maintain good relations with the Malfoy's was rather...suspicious.

Not that telling us to behave was all that odd, that's typical mother behavior, but in my past four years of life I had learned a thing or two about being a Black, and rule number one of the Black Family was that we lower ourselves to _no-one._

It's half the reason, I believe, that Regulus was the only confirmed Black to have become a Death Eater in the books (Cousin Bella doesn't count as she was already married.) Mother and father may believe in all that pure-blood crap, and may have even pushed Regulus to join the Dark Lord the first time around, but _they _never joined because _a Black bows to _**No-one. **Thus I was slightly disconcerned by mother's constant repition on how I should 'defer' to Lord Malfoy.

I was old enough-mentally-to realize their was an undercurrent to what she was saying, but young enough-physically-that she didn't feel the need to explain_._

It was really frustrating.

My only solace was that Siri and Reg seemed to be out of the loop too. I caught some whispers from them hinting at the fact that they were both much older when they attended their first ball, I had no-way of knowing if this may be a gender thing. Maybe girls entered the social scene before boys? Or a maturity thing-there was no doubt in my mind that I seemed more mature than a four-year old Siri or even Reg would have. Or perhaps it was something else entirely that I couldn't see. I simply didn't know.

Hence the frustration.

Regardless, Christmas Eve had me dressed in my best-and first-dress robes. They were emerald green which, despite being an obvious nod towards our ties to Slytherin, were most likely chosen to bring out my eyes which liked to fluctuate between a stormy gray-blue and cloudy green depending on my outfit. It was rather pretty even if it was extremely stuffy and hot...and this was in the middle of winter, so that's saying something.

After Kreacher had magicked my robes on I was told to make my way down to the foyer were my brothers would 'escort me' (via floo) to the Malfoy's Estate. This was to be Reg's first social event since turning thirteen, which-evidentally-was the age in which a Pure-blood Witch or Wizard was 'introduced' to society. In other words, today Reg was to 'come out' so that family's could start, officially, introducing him to their daughters, for Reg was of marrying age.

It was all really ridiculously old fashioned, I mean sure it was only 1974 (going on to '75) and we had a lot of social change to undergo as a nation-a planet-but we were still far enough along that we should be allowed to chose who we were to marry, at an age _far_ older than thirteen. Although it was true that no-one really got married before they were of age anymore, even if they were engaged after their coming out.

Anywho, because this was to be Reg's "coming out" he couldn't enter with Sirius and I through the Foyer, oh no! He had to be taken to the top of the stair case were his arrival would be announced to all, and where-for the first time-he would be referred to as 'Lord Black' rather than 'Master Black.' There would be a lot of socializing and butt-kissing which basically translated to Sirius being on baby-sitting duty.

I wasn't going to be able to spend this event glued to Reg's side, and he wasn't going to be able to spend it hiding in the shadows.

_What could go wrong._

**:::**

"Sirius?!" My mother shrieked, and man did she have a set of lungs on her, "SIRIUS ORION BLACK! You will NOT make this family LATE!"

"Coming!" Sirius called running down the staircase dress robes haphazardly thrown on.

"What are you wearing?" Mother continued at a respectable volume, "how many times do I have to tell you Sirius. You are a Black, the Black Heir no less! Your actions are a direct reflection on your upbringing, on _me_ and the entire House!"

Sirius seemed to be doing his level best to ignore mothers rant, not that I could really blame him, this was per course around here. Sirius ran a few seconds late because he was trying to make himself 'presentable' mother yelled at him to 'hurry up,' when he listened to her he inevitably ended up looking like some street urchin which of course ended with a half-hour lecture from mother that only made us _more late_.

I just sighed and made myself comfortable, once mother got started there was no stopping her.

"-don't understand how I could raise such a rude, and inconsiderate child! Today is Regulus's big day! _He _never held up the family last summer solstice when you insisted on coming out at the Potter's Soiree."

"-I told you that you didn't have to come! And who wants to go through with all these stuffy traditions anyway?"

Not that Sirius ever got the memo...

The argument continued on for quite some time before father, bless his soul, thought to intervene on Reg's behalf.

"Dear...don't you think we should get going? It wouldn't do for Regulus to be late today of all days, and the Malfoys' wanted to meet Amalthea before too many guests arrived and their hosting duties pulled them away..."

_Wait, what? Who wanted to meet me?_

"You're right," Mother sighed before shooting Siri a 'this-is-not-over' look, which he returned full-fold. I strongly believed that the two got into so many arguments because they were both so similar-bullheaded, and self-righteous to a fault. It didn't help that they disagreed on core-ideals and didn't believe in compromise, or even discussion sometimes. It was their way or the high-way. I was rather worried that Sirius would still be leaving for the Potter's in two years despite my presence.

There wasn't much one could do to convince a rebellious teenage son to live with a mother who was ready to disown him at a moments notice. Not that mother didn't love him, she just thought he was making all the wrong choices in his life for himself and his House, and in her defense she had no way of knowing that Voldemort would fall to toddler a few years after Sirius left.

Not that it excused her actions. But I digress. After father managed to get mother to calm down we made our way to the Floo. Father and Mother let Siri and I go first, then they came next with Regulus following soon after. He quickly disappeared for some super-secret waiting room that I would learn about when I turned thirteen and Mother and Father turned to find our hosts.

Except the Malfoys beat them to it, as I found myself lifted into the arms of Cousin Narcissa-who I managed to recognize from her coo-ings of "aren't you just the cutest, you simply _must _call me 'Cissa. Lucius, isn't she just perfect? I told you she would be perfect!"

"Fo' whad?" I questioned, concerned. I didn't mind being held, I'd gotten used to it over the years, but I had just turned _four _I was no-longer the baby Narcissa was treating me like. I was now a rather curious little kid who was really interested in _what she'd be perfect for.  
_

"Dear," a man, whom I assumed to be Lucius, interrupted "I think little Miss Black would appreciate it if you put her down, I would too-you know how I feel about you straining yourself."

"Oh, honestly Lucius. She doesn't even weigh a stone! I'm fine, I assure you, you needn't worry about me or the baby. The healer said I could still be relatively active for a few months yet."

_Wait. What?_

"Has it been confirmed then?" Mother inquired, "the gender I mean. When last you owled you said that you were still unsure."

"Oh! Yes, a boy. Isn't that wonderful? Just like we were hoping."

_What?!_

"Should we continue our talks about the engagement?" Lucius interjected, silkily, "I am sure you can agree that a contract between Miss Amalthea and little Draco would be in everyone's best interest."

_WHAT!?_

"AMALTHEA DOREA BLACK!" Mother screeched, "You. are. a. LADY. and a lady **_DOES NOT_ **interrupt her _elders_!"

_Oops, guess I said that out-loud. But, but, but this doesn't make any sense. Draco's not meant to be born for another five years, AT LEAST. There's no-way my birth could have affected this...could it?_

**"Amalthea,"** mother hissed, "what do you have to say for yourself?"

"Sowy, moder, fader, Cousin Cissy."

"It's perfectly fine, dear," Narcissa coo-ed, it was clear that she loved babies, or anyone small and cuddly enough to pass as 'baby-ish,' "I know I always hated when people spoke about me as if I wasn't there. I'll tell you what, why don't you go with Cousin Sirius here while us grown-ups talk, and after we've gotten everything sorted out I promise to find you and tell you exactly what was said, deal?"

_That's not exactly what I was freaking out about, but..._" 'kay," I replied while she carefully lowered me down.

"_Amalthea,_ we do not say 'kay' we let our 'yes' mean 'yes' and our 'no' mean 'no,' honestly who even taught you such deplorable language?" Mother questioned, "in my day such blatant abuse of language would get you sent to the rack!"

"Mother, in your day _talking_ at all would get you sent to the rack! It was basically the Dark Ages." Sirius muttered bitterly, grabbing my hand and dragging me from the group of adults. "Come on Thea. Let's see if we can't find _some-one _worthwhile."

I just let Sirius drag me around, too lost in thought to notice who we passed. The ball was just beginning and already things were going to hell, this was looking to be one hell of a day.

* * *

So this is one of those chapters that just refused to get written, I can't tell you why it was being so resilient but for whatever reason it didn't want to get out there. Hopefully my writing hasn't suffered from this small writer's block.

Anyway, thanks to all who read and reviewed, you guys are the reason I write!

**Vaughn Tyler:** Thank you :)

**Tempest:** Yeah, I can understand that frustration, although-in Canon-James acted more like a brother to Sirius than Regulus did. But I agree that it was frustrating how he completely glossed over Reg when talking to Harry, because he was a 'Death Eater.'

**Nan: **Non taken :) well you have to remember that Thea doesn't know Reg is planning to be a spy. She's trying to change things by debunking who Reg thought the Death Eaters were from the get-go, hence her calling them 'bad guys.' From her view if Reg knows who they are, he won't join, and if he doesn't join he doesn't die. But in real-life a plan never survives an encounter with the enemy, or in this case, an encounter with a little boy who thinks he knows better than his "three year old" little sister. As for 'the point' well Thea cast a pebble and the ripples won't be felt for awhile, but they _will _be felt.

**JollyLoser:** Wow, four reviews in one day! I won't be able to reply to everything here, but I'll try ;)

08 - She's not a real Seer, but since she's from "the future" as well as having read all 7 HP Books, she has enough knowledge to pretend she's a Seer for awhile. Her nightmares are real though, and they are about future events-hence why the Medi-wizard thought her powers were manifesting after looking in her mind.  
09 - XD you don't have to justify Peter-bashing to me, no worries!  
10 - Haha, well things will definitely be different between Peter and Sirius this time around, as for everything else...we'll see ;)  
11 - Mwahahaha! Yeah Bill will be making an appearance...eventually. Yup Reg understands Thea because of how similar they are.

**Chihori Anigma: **That's true, he is only 13, it won't be easy for him that's for sure.

**Whispers in the Dawn: **Thank you!

**SNicole25: **It will translate to Sirius a little, even if he doesn't do it consciously-keeping an eye out-he won't be able to turn a blind eye to any suspicious actions this time around.

**Debate4life: **Thank you. That's true, its hard to show any character development for other characters at this point, but hopefully I'll be able to work on that in later chapters.

**chibi-no-baka: **Thank you, here you go!

**Ookamihime Ichimaru: **Reg is her confident, if not her favorite-its hard to pick favorites amongst siblings-then the brother she's closest to. But she's spent the most time with him so it makes sense. Especially since they're both introverts, they understand each other best. She won't be attending Hogwarts with them, unfortunately. She's 10 years younger than Sirius, and 9 years younger than Reg. Whoot! A fellow snake! Yeah, I understand. I hated how bigoted the other houses were, I mean how is ambition-by itself-evil? What if I wanted to find a cure to lycanthropy or create a shield spell capable of defending against the killing curse? That would be ambitious, but not evil. Hopefully Thea will be able to convert all the other unbelievers out there ;)

**telmios: **Haha, thanks. I'm happy you're enjoying the story. Yeah things are going to be different this time around. Reg will have a hard time as a spy, but hopefully he'll find himself a natural.


	13. Yule Ball

Have you ever had one of those days where everything just went, horribly, inexiplacably, irreaparibly, **_wrong_**? A day that seemed perfectly normal when suddenly-without warning-you were forced to live through a series of unfortunate events? One after another you seemed to be hit with a curve-ball? Until you stopped questioning everything and just accepted it as one of 'those days'?

Well I'm not too sure if my first Yule Ball could really classify as one of 'those days' I'm sure that it was perfectly enjoyable in its own right. But for the life of me I can only remember the bad.

Everything else was just a blur of colors and sounds.

I clearly remember Sirius leading me away from our parents after the _bombshell_ that was baby Draco and our soon to be engagement. I remember us finding a nice little aclove to just sit and watch people from. At some point in the night I know Sirius had gotten me some pumpkin juice-or rather had gotten a house elf to do so. But aside from that it's all rather...spotty. However a few key scenes did stick out, and _they were_ what led me to lable this Ball as one of 'those days'.

**::::**

"Now entering; Master Regulus Arcturus Black, Son of Lord Orion Cygnus Black and Lady Walburga Violetta Black, Brother to Lord Sirius Orion Black and Miss Amalthea Dorea Black. Second Son of the Main Line of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. Born on the 27th day of the Third Month of the Year 1961 CE." Harolded some random man, probably of a lesser Noble House who had managed himself an invite by volunteering to announce those Wizards and Witches who were to 'Come Out.'

"Today we welcome Master Black as our Brother amongst the Sacred Twenty-Eight and would like to extend our gratitude at being _honored_ as the first to address you by your new title." Lucius Malfoy spoke from his place next to Regulus, atop the foyer's staircase.

"The honor remains unto me, Dear Cousin. For the invitation you have extended onto myself." I was slightly surprised by Reg's address for Lucius. Tradition dictated that the Host be referred to as "Dear Friend" unless in the cases of direct familial lineage. By calling Lucius "Dear Cousin" Reg was effectively claiming the Malfoys as both allies and family of the House of Black...publicly.

_I never knew Reg was so close to Lucius...didn't he have a problem with him a few years ago?_ Chancing a glance at Sirius I noticed his look of consternation before turning away-and thus missing his 'aha!' moment._ Sirius is confused too so it must be a recent development. Maybe its because of Cousin Narcissa? She was always Reg's favorite, or_ maybe...NO!_ it won't have anything to do with **them** Reg believed me about them, I_ **know**_ he did._

"Then rise Master Black, and take your rightful place as a Lord of your House!"

"Now entering; **Lord** Regulus Arcturus Black, Son of Orion Cygnus Black and Walburga Violetta Bla..."

**::::**

"Man, I forgot how stuffy these Balls were," Siri muttered from beside my side. It had been a few hours since we had separated from Mother and Father and I was beginning to feel the strain of a late night on my, still rather young, body. It didn't help that I was an introvert by nature, and all of the sights, smells, and sounds were severely overloading my senses, while the large number of guests were slowly draining my energy.

Honestly I was surprised that Reg had managed to survive with a smile on his face the whole evening. _Speaking of Reg, he hasn't come to say 'hi' to us once, this night._

I pulled on Sirius's robes to get his attention, asking him if we could perhaps head over to Reg. He just shrugged and made a bee-line through the dance floor, oblivious to-or simply a master at ignoring-all the disapproving glances sent his way.

**::::**

"-don't see how his _views _are unbecoming of an heir, don't you agree Regulus?" Some kid who I quickly identified as Rabastan Lestrange the younger brother of Rodolophus whispered as Sirius and I slowly approached the group of boys.

Regulus, who had yet to notice our approach, simply sneered, "It is not that they do not notice, Rabastan, but that they lack the cunning to do anything about it. A trait that I am proud to say, I _do not _share."

The third boy-I think it was Avery-started coughing, trying to alert the other two to our eavesdropping, no doubt. But Regulus just continued with his monolouge, "you'll see. Before too long you two will be referring to _me _as the Black Heir."

"Is that so?"

Reg spun around so fast I wondered how he managed to keep his grip on the floor. "Sirius?" He questioned eyes flying from Siri to me and back again, before something-I couldn't tell what-settled in his gaze, and he straigtened his stance. If I didn't know better I would assume he was getting ready for a battle. "I was just-

"-you were just planning my death!" My older brother spat, viscously.

"Sirius, don't be so melodramatic. I would never try something so _barbaric_. I was simply talking politics to my friends here, as we all know **_you_** have shown no interest in the subject."

Sirius seemed taken aback for a moment, before something solidified in _his_ gaze and he started cursing out Regulus and his pure-blood supremacy views _loudly_ and infront of **_everyone_**_. _I was at a loss, why were my brothers at each other's throats? And why was Sirius so stupid as to walk into such an obvious trap? I didn't need to see the smirk on Regulus's face to know that he had just _set Sirius up._

Honestly, _what_ was going on?

**::::**

"Once again I must apologize on behalf of my son, Narcissa, honestly I have no idea what has come over him." Mother whispered ashamed.

"It's perfectly fine, I know how _energetic _Cousin Sirius can be. Even as a Seventh Year I managed to hear rumors about Sirius and that Potter boy. I'm just happy that Sirius has...err...been raised to...um...have such an open mind?"

Mother's face had grown more and more blank as Narcissa spoke, "rest assured. Sirius's...political views...are his own, and do not reflect the beliefs of the House of Black, and if he does not learn how to conduct himself in proper society may not reflect the beliefs of the _Heir _of Black much longer, either."

Mother's threat seemed to completly fly over Sirius's head who had taken to muttering, "political views my arse. It's called morals. A concience. You know that thing that whispers to you whenever-nevermind, I forgot, you _don't_ know."

I watched flumoxed as Father dragged Sirius away towards the floo, with Mother trailing after. Regulus began to lead me away but not before sending a smirk over his shoulder towards Cousin Narcissa who seemed rather, perplexed. _At least I'm not the only one._

**:::: **

"SIRIUS ORION BLACK," I heard mother scream the moment Reg and I stepped through the floo, "IN ALL MY YEARS-

"-And we all know how long _that's_ been."

"-BEEN SO EMBARASSED..."

"Really? What? Do you just avoid mirrors as a general rule?"

"-SHOULD BE ASHAMED..."

"I'm actually rather proud of myself. Isn't that what you're always saying? A Black should _never_ feel ashamed, because we can **_do no wrong_**?"

"-YOU'RE FATHER GETS THROUGH WITH YOU!"

"..."

At the threat of Father's wrath Sirius finally fell silent, and with him so did Mother. Reg led me up to my room and called Kreacher to cast a silencing charm around my bed before leaving. He was in and out so fast that I didn't even get a chance to call him out on his behaviour, not that I had really cared at that moment in time-I was out as soon as my head hit a pillow.

**::::**

Before I knew it the break had passed and Reg and Sirius were returning to Hogwarts. I still didn't know what had happened at the Yule Ball. They both seemed perfectly happy with each other the next day. In fact, the next morning-after seeing each other at breakfast-they had both started laughing quietly to themselves, and the next day it had been as if nothing had happened at all. If anything they seemed _closer_ as impossible as that sounded.

I decided to put it out of my mind, I'm not a boy but I can only guess that it was a guy thing. Besides I had too many things on my mind to really concentrate on something as trivial as a fight between siblings.

Mother had decided that I needed to 'get used' to the idea that I would one day be a Malfoy and so I would start having Sunday Tea with her, Narcissa, Augustus Longbottom, and Astraea Greengrass at the Malfoy Manor.

I didn't understand how they could expect a four year old child who had barely started understanding what it meant to be a Black to start wrapping her mind around the concept of _also _being a Malfoy. And it was most definitely an 'also.'

Mother _made sure_ I understood that.

No matter who I married and what they asked of me, the fact remained that I was born a Black an _**honor** _that they could never claim. Thus I had certain expectations that I would have to strive to meet even after my name had changed. Just look at Bellatrix, she may have adapted the name 'Lestrange' but she continued practicing with the Black family curses religiously, and was making a name for herself in the Aurora Corps.

Even Narcissa was doing her blood proud by giving birth to a Malfoy heir so soon, and that's exactly what mother believed. Narcissa was doing her _duty_ by giving birth to 'Draco' (I decided to refer to him as 'Drake' mentally as I refused to believe he was the same Draco from the books.) As far as my mother was concerned, any and all things I-and any Black-accomplished in my (our) life would be do to my (our) Black blood, it was actually kind of annoying and if I were slightly younger-mentally-I could easily see myself developing a need, a thirst even, to prove myself to her.

I don't know whether she did it consciously or not but it was easy to see how so many Slytherins were born to the Black Family line, if everyone was raised with the same expectations that mother raised us. I'm still not entirely sure that the Sorting Hat wouldn't have put Sirius in Slytherin had he not _asked _to be put in Gryfinddor-and I'm sure he asked, no matter what he said. Then again, cunning and ambition don't really describe my big brother, perhaps he would have been a Hufflepuff then, if their were no stigmas on any of the Houses. Loyalty is what he's known-will be known-for, after all.

Anyway, the point was at four years old mother was already heaping on the expectations, and yet she hadn't told anyone about my 'abilities.' She had gone so far as to warn me off talking about my visions-not that I would. It was surprising because it meant that, in her own way, mother was putting my own well-being above her social standing. After all, having a Seer in the family is great honor, and yet mother was keeping quite about my abilities.

_Or maybe she knows something I don't._

* * *

**A/N: **Super sorry to everyone for the late update! Life-as it tends to do-got in the way, and it didn't help that this chapter _did **not**_ want to get written. I blame the Ball, it was just being obstinante, so I compromised and only wrote the key scenes. Hopefully it didn't come out too badly. Anywho, thanks to all who read/alerted/favorited/ and-my personal favourite-reviewed! You guys are all awesome!

**Deleat: **Haha yeah that's why I started this fic in the first place. I had read so many great Naruto SI's and I wanted to find something similar in HP, after all there are some great OC stories in this fandom, unfortunately all SI's were a "girl falls through a portal" kind so I just decided _I _would write it. As for DoS and AQ, of course they're in my favourites! They're too amazing not to be! ;)

**SNicole25**: I will neither confirm nor deny your very logical guess ;) but I will say that I always found it odd that Draco was an only child, as was Nymphadora, when nearly every other member of the Black Family had _at least_ two children, and that Draco seemed almost _ridiculously _spoiled by his parents...make of that what you will.

**BlueFlame27: **Haha, well I agree that Narcissa is often portrayed as detached and cold, but its important to remember that this was Narcissa at age 20, in front of her family. This was before the first war as well, and the interaction happened before the party started and she was required to be 'the hostess.' She's also currently pregnant and thus her maternal instincts are on overdrive. There will be some characterization to show/imply how _this_ happy, motherly, nearly care-free women becomes the slightly stand-offish cold Lady of Malfoy of the future. Also, I absolutely _**love **_Doctor Who! (Whovians FTW!) and while I was writing that scene I wasn't intending to mimic Tennet, but I noticed it after the second 'What,' all I could see was Donna in her wedding dress in the middle of Malfoy Manor XD.

**Whispers in the Dawn:** Haha, well I don't think she actually cares all that much about the engagement at the moment, but I'm sure she'll get creative if the need arises.

**MerelyLily:** Hi Raven! You're names changed twice now, huh? Anyway, you're question is begging to start some kind of philosophy debate. Would the baby be 'Draco' because he was named so, or would five years make him a completely different person? And if he's not 'Draco' would he change _our _Draco by having an older brother? Either way, the simple answer is; spoilers! Sorry ;) Yeah, hopefully Reg and Siri don't lose themselves to their roles.

**telmios: **I'm happy that Sirius's back-talk makes you smile, it's a lot of fun for me to write. Reg and Thea are such obedient children-Thea mainly because she's only 'four' her opinions don't really matter-that I get bored sometimes. But then Sirius is there snickering in a corner and mocking his mother, and that makes everything more enjoyable :)

**purple sky always: **Haha, well that's about the last thing she's paying attention to right now, but she can be quite creative-vindictive even-if the need arises.


	14. Walburga I

**A/N: **This hasn't been edited due to the weather-litterally. It's storming heavily over here and the power keeps flickering on and off, so after about an hour of trying to edit it I decided to bow to the whims of Mother Nature and just post it as is, hopefully I'll be able to fix any spelling/grammer mistakes tommorow...

* * *

Walburga Violetta Black was a very cunning woman. They say the strongest swords were forged through fire and Walburga had lived through her fair share of fires.

The eldest of three she had ridden into the world on the wave of a scandal- the child of a boy. Of course Walburga had been far too young to realize that her "father" was not infact Cygnus Black, a respectable Lord and rising politician, but rather his thirteen year old son.

For the first three years of her life she had been raised in the shelter of 13 Grimmauld Place alongside her 'brother' Pollux. Hidden away from the world-and the world from her-until both were ready to face one another.

It came as quite a suprise when-straight out of Hogwarts-Pollux married Irma Crabbe who had been five years his senior as Walburga had always thought he had held special feelings for Cousin Cedrella.

But, as she would later come to find, Irma was pregnant, with twins, and it would not do to have the male family branch be born out of wedlock.

Not when they carried the expectations of the Black name on their backs.

A fact that people never bothered to hide from Walburga; she was a female, destined to belong to another House, thus she was of _little importance_ when compared to Alphard and Cygnus II.

But then she was also a child born out of wed-lock to a boy too young to understand his actions had consequences...her prospects had always been bleak.

But Walburga was-if nothing else-a survivor, when Alphard and Cygnus were born and the truth of her parentage made known to her (and Walburga still felt the sting of betrayel that Pollux-Father-would have had Mother give birth to her and then kept away for nigh on three years) rather than break down, as was expected, Walburga built herself up.

So what if she was born out of wedlock? So what if her 'big brother' was to be her father?

_'So what?'_ She thought,_'I am a Black, and a Black does not falter. A Black does not bend. And a Black_ **never**_ breaks. I am a Black, and that hasn't changed._

Walburga saw the challenge for what it was-a _challenge._ No-one cares if someone born into privilege retains their position-that's par course in society-but when someone comes from behind and rises through the ranks? Well there was a reason that Grindlewald and Dumbledore captured the minds of the plebians and nobility alike-they were a varitable example of the 'rags to riches' tripe that people so loved.

So Walburga plotted and planed, nothing too sinister-there was only so much a female could do in the 1930s-but she made connections, and more importantly **made** her connections, helped shape them into useful pieces for the future.

Most Blacks found themeselves in Slytherin because they held a need to prove themeselves and from this need their ambition stemmed, every other trait springing forth to aid in their goals, but Walburga was different.

She was not terribly ambitious- she just wanted a life not tainted by the scandal of her birth, a life in which she could be a true Pure-Blood Matron as was her birth right. No, ambition was not why she found herself in Slytherin, but rather her cunning and cleverness.

Walburga saw the world as a chessboard.

The people but pieces to be moved until the optimal result had been aquired. Not that she didn't care for the people in her life, but she had been betrayed very early and in a very base and personal way, to say Walburga had trust issues was, to put it lightly, a gross understatement.

It was a mere stroke of luck that brought Walburga and Orion together. Walburga was the same age as Orion's elder sister Lucretia and Orion was the same age as Walburga's two brothers. But Walburga had always felt closest to Aunt Dorea who had basically been Walburga's sister.

So close, in fact, that Walburga had shadowed Dorea in Hogwarts, even while making friends with Augustus and a few others-such as that Tom Riddle who was a year behind her and yet two years ahead, mentally, Walburga just new that boy would make a name for himself one day.

Walburga spent so much time with Dorea that she was all but ignorant to Lucretia's existence, a child's ability to ignore her surroundings should never be underestimated. And may have continued on-oblivious to her future best friend-had Dorea not come down with Dragon- pox halfway through Walburga's second year. Leaving her severly companionless for a few weeks until she-quite litterally-bumped into Lucretia.

Lucretia was from the Main Branch of the Black Family, and as a member of a Side Branch-especially considering her 'status'-Walburga'd had little interaction with her Second-Cousin. Thus, it had come as quiet a suprise when-after running into each other, and presenting themeselves with the necessary introductions-the two had found that they 'clicked,' for lack of a better word.

They were both soon to be 'Ladies of the House of Black' both elder sisters of 'annoying 8 year old pests' and, most importantly, both _f__emale _in a distinctly male-ruled society and House. The two knew, better than anyone else that their days as wards of the House of Black were numbered.

It was Lucretia who first suggested an arrangement between Orion and Walburga. After the whole Chamber of Secrets ordeal in their sixth year when Walburga had realized just how close the school had come to closing and with it any chance of her finding a halfway decent match.

It had been one of those throw away lines that friends often make with out consideration of fact. 'You should marry my brother, so that we could become sisters in more than just name.' It could have worked either way, Lucretia could have just as easily married Cygnus or Alphard (although with every year that passed in which Alphard failed to marry, Walburga grew less and less sure that such match would have been successful-that any match of its kind would in fact succeed.)

But Cygnus and Alphard were branch memebers, even if they were Blacks, to marry them would be to Marry below her station. As the first born of the Head of the House of Black Lucretia could have anyone she wanted, and Walburga knew both Ignatttius Prewett and Abraxas Malfoy had been paying her more mind recently. But in the reverse, if Walburga were to marry _Orion _well that would not only cement her place in her friends life but also elevate her status by a considerable margin.

Of course, Orion was but a snot-nossed Second Year and so Walburga put such thoughts out of her mind. It wasn't until a few years later, when attending her brothers' graduation ceremony did Walburga meet Orion again.

At the time she was 21 and working as a Secretary with the Ministry, hoping to save some money for when she was inevitably booted from her ancestral home. Cygnus was to be engaged to Druella Rosier come next equionox, if he could manage to get up the nerve to propose, and Walburga was under no illusions that Grimmauld Place would pass to them once the union had been oficiated.

Thus it was that she had found herself, hair slightly dissarrayed, rushing to the Great Hall to see Dippet-or had he retired?-hand her brothers their Certificate of Completion. She managed to slip in before the Ceremony had gotten too far underway, in fact she had made it just in time to hear the Head Boy give his farewell speech. It was the first time Walburga had seen Orion speak in public, and-although she would deny ir with her last breath-it was at that moment that she had fallen in love with her soon to be Head of House.

She couldn't help it, he had been so _calm_ and **_collected_** waxing poetically about his '_last seven years in these_ _hallowed halls'_ and how '_just like the arithmancy symbol_ _suggests_' the years had been filled with_ 'a constant search and thirst for Truth. A mystical, and spiritual experience_' that he claimed helped to '_not only shape and guide who we were into who we are, but who we are into who we are capable of becoming.'_

Walburga could not quite recall what her own Head Boy had said-she had been much too ready to graduate at the time, but to this day she doubted he had spun words as skillfully, and dare she say _sinfully_ as Orion had. A half-decade after Lucretia had so innocently planted the seed the thought began to blossom.

_'I want to marry that man.'_

Unfortunately life is never that simple and it would be a long and arduous path that saw the two wed, but eventually they were married, and after nearly three-decades of living under the shame of her father's mistakes Walburga found herself at peace. A peace she vowed to protect with every fiber of her being.

She had lived under the shadow of a scandal for long enough to know she would never wish such a life on her children. She would raise them to be the perfect heirs they were born to be, and make sure they never knew the hardships she'd had to face growing up.

At first she had-perhaps naively-assumed that such a task would be easy. After all she was sure that she had been a rather calm child growing up-even if her father's snort of derision seemed to imply otherwise-in any case Orion was so naturally quiet surely their child would be too?

In later years Walburga would often laugh at the thought that there had ever been a time when she had imagined Sirius to be a quiet child. No, Sirius had taken after Walburga too much to stay quiet, or he had taken after an alternate-Walburga who could voice her opinions without fear of being abandoned.

He was, after all, the Heir, and Walburga had accepted that a certain degree of entitlement came with the position but sometimes she wondered if that child even understood how good he had it.

_I am a Black._

He was always so quick to spout his political views denouncing anything his parents had to say. But he never seemed to sit down and think about what he was preaching, after all equality was all well and good for those on the dredge of society, they had nowhere to go but up.

But to the elite? What did they get out of the deal except pain, loss, and suffering? Sirius had been raised his whole life to be the Head of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black and-although Walburga would never admit so outloud-would make a fantastic Head once the years had curbed his recklessness.

But he wasn't much suited for anything else, not with his lack of ambition, and drive, he could barely submit to parental authority how would he be able to function in a job under a boss?

No, Sirius was just a child paroting the ideals of a man he viewed with Hero worship, it was Walburga's job to prevent him from making igarrious errors in life, and this certainly qualified. She would not let him throw his future away.

_A Black does not Falter._

Then there was Regulus, a sweetheart who, much like his father, was of a softer-shade. Regulus was not like his brother, he was not made for the pressures of being Head, Walburga was no fool-she could see how her youngest son shied away from even the basest form of socialization.

She had allowed him most of his childhood to hide in the Shadow of his Big Brother she was not so cruel as to force him to act the Heir when he was not. Regulus she allowed to be a child, were Sirius was groomed to be the perfect Heir by Orion, Regulus was cultivated to have the shrewd mind Walburga had forged in herself. While he need not fear being turned out-he was going to have to make plans to secure his future.

Where Sirius was too enthusiastic too vocal about 'his' beliefs Regulus was too quite, too withdrawn. Walburga had to worry about Sirius making friends with the wrong sort, true. But she had to worry about Regulus making friends, period.

Thus, Walburga made it a point to drag Regulus to every social gathering she could, he was introduced to the Averys, the Carrows, the Noxs, the Crabbes, the Goyles, and even the Bones. He was forced to socialize and befriend anyone and everyone Walburga deemed 'benificial' he was a brilliant student but connections were everything. And Walburga would make sure Regulus made connections that would last him a life-time.

_A Black does not Bend._

And finally there was Amalthea. Walburga never quite knew what to make of the child. Most days she was-much like Regulus-quiet and withdrawn, but never quite with the the same level of self-consciousness as her brother.

And Walburga couldn't understand were the child got such a surety of self. She seemed to be so confident in every word, every step, as quiet as she was your eyes couldn't help but be drawn to her...presence.

Frankly, it had unnerved Walburga for the longest time, for months Walburga had entertained the thought that perhaps there was something _**wrong**_ with her youngest. She had never brought it up with Orion had pacidly agreed at how 'bright' and 'naturally Slytherin' Amalthea was all the while noting that she was perhaps a bit _too_ bright, her manipulations a bit _too_ designed.

But Walburga kept her thoughts to herself, she loved her daughter dearly and would not risk her reputation on something as infantile as a 'hunch.' It was a lucky thing too as Walburga would soon learn that her daughter was not **wrong** not _**diseased**_ as she has led herself to believe, but rather _gifted_ an Empath and a Seer.

Walburga was over-joyed, here was something to be cherished. The ability to know when one was lied to, to see life's pitfalls before they happened, with those gifts at her disposal Amalthea was all but garunteed an easy life.

Or so she thought.

Nothing is quiet as terrifying for a mother as having to watch your child have a night-terror. She hid her concern well, of course, one must always appear calm in the face of fear-especially when one's child is present and looking to you for direction.

But having to hear Amalthea scream herself hoarse everynight, watch as she slowly fades from the lack of decent sleep, and _know_ that you couldn't make it all disappear with a "there, there, no need to be afraid, they're just dreams, not real" when they could very well _become_ real at any point-was_..._**_maddening._**

It pushed Walburga to her breaking point. But she was a Black, and so handled the situation with all the grace a Woman of her stature could manage. So that by the time Yule had ended and both Sirius and Regulus had seen themeselves back to school Amalthea was, once again, sleeping through the night. But she resolved to keep a closer eye on her daughter from them on, perhaps it was time she joined in afternoon tea? After all compared to her brothers how much did Walburga really know about her youngest?

Things were changing, Walburga could feel it. Things were begining to shift and for some reason her daughter was a part of the change. Walburga was not a fighter, she couldn't battle to save her life. But Walburga Violetta Black was cunning, and possessed a sword-toung forged in the fires of a scandal. When it came to words she could dual with the best of them.

Yes, things were starting to change. People were going to be tested. Relationships strained. And families broken, but Walburga wasn't worried because she was a Black;

_And a Black_ **never**_ Breaks._

* * *

So the amount of fact-checking I've had to do this chapter was just plain ridiculous, as was trying to give Walburga a believable back story when the Black Family Tree says she was born _thirteen _years after her father ah well, I tried. Don't worry next chapter's not an interlude to Orion's thoughts, we won't get that for _a long _time yet. But Walburga needed a bit of fleshing out, she's more than just the slightly screechy 'Mother' Thea has dubbed her.

Anyway, thanks to all who Read and Reviewed.

**Whispers in the Dawn: **Thank you so much! Yeah that is always a challenge in this kind of fic, you want the characters to do things but they are young and naivee with a limited skill set, there is only so much they can do without _someone _picking up on _something. _Ah, yes! I meant Auror, thanks for pointing that out!

**Purple sky always: **Yeah, plans are great. You've got to love their ability to move along plot ;)

**Vivien Lestrange:** Yay for giving things a try! And I'm happy you're enjoying it so far, hopefully it will continue down a path you like!

**BlueFlame27: **XD all I see are a bunch of wizards running around trying to figure out how someone bi-passed their anti-apparation wards, and then the Doctor shows up to pick up Donna-cuz, leaking Huon particles, can't be left alone now can she? And Thea's just standing there looking at the TARDIS contemplating all the plans for the future she'd made over the last 4 years, before saying "screw it!" and ditching everyone to go travel through time-and-space with a mad-man and his box ;)

**SNicole25: **I doubt Walburga would arrange a match between a Weasley and Thea as her Great Aunt Cedrella was blasted off the Family Tapestry for "marrying Septimus Weasley" but I'm sure she'll find someone, sometime. I doubt it'll be high on the 'to-do list' after Voldemort makes his move, though.


End file.
